SPECULUM 55,1 (1980)

Bede's VeraLex Historiae

By Roger Ray
Toward the end of the epistolarypreface to the Historiaecclesiastica,
Bede
asked that none blame him should the narrativecontain errors,for he had
triedto instructposterityby settingdown, according to what he calls "vera lex
historiae, thingscollected from common report:
Lectoremque suppliciterobsecro ut, siqua in his quae scripsimusaliter quam se

veritashabetpositareppererit,
non hoc nobisinputet,qui, quod veralex historiae
ea quae famavulgantecollegimus
ad instructionem
posteritatis
litteris
est,simpliciter
mandarestuduimus.1
Until 1947, when Charles W. Jones published Saints'Lives and Chroniclesin
EarlyEngland, no one had questioned the view that this"true law of history"
was evidence of critical scholarship, of "the transparent good faith," as
Charles Plummer wrote, with which Bede used hearsay sources.2 Nor had
much more been said about it,except to note thatin Bede's writingsthe words
veralexhistoriae
firstappear in the commentaryon Luke. There Bede explains
thatthe Evangelist,"opinionem vulgi exprimens,quae vera historiaelex est,"
spoke in 2.33-34 as if Joseph were the natural father of Jesus.3
Plummerand WilhelmLevison quoted thispassage fromIn Lucam but gave
no estimateof its possible importancefor the preface of the HE.4 For Jones
the commenton Luke 2 lay at the heart of Bede's historiography.5
He found
that the vera lex historiaeof In Lucam came verbatimfrornJerome'sAdversus
Helvidium.In thistractBede learned, said Jones,that"the true law of history"
led the Evangeliststo teach theologyand moralsthroughpopular information
whose factual truthwas unimportant.The New Testament narrators,when
theyspoke as thoughJesus had a human father,even made hereticalopinio
vulgi serve a didactic purpose. Thus the vera lex historiaeof the HE, "in
consonance with the Gospels, is to express the common view- to use accepted symbols for attainingthe ideal end, though the words may not be
1 Bede, Ilistoriaecclesiastica
Praef.,ed. BertramColgrave and R. A. B. Mynors(Oxford, 1969),
p. 6. This edition hereaftercited as HE.
2 See Venerabilis
Bedae operahistorica,
ed. Charles Plummer(Oxford, 1896), 1:xliv-xlv,n. 3; and
2:3-4, where Plummer cites the similar views of Theodor E. Mommsen, "Die Papstbriefebei
Beda," NeuesArchiv17 (1892), 389. In thisvein see also WilhelmLevison,"Bede the Historian,"in
Alexander H. Thompson, ed., Bede,His Life,Times,and Writings
(1935; repr., New York, 1966),
pp. 140-141.
3 Bede, In EvangeliumLucae expositio
2, lines 1908 -1911, CCSL 120.
4Opera historica,
ed. Plummer, 2:3-4; Levison, "Bede," p. 141, n. 1.
Charles W. Jones,Saints'Livesand Chronicles
in EarlyEngland (1947; repr., New York, 1968),
pp. 80-93, esp. 83.

Bede's VeraLex Historiae

factuallytrue."6 All this Jones wrote to correct the assumption that Bede
pursued factual accuracy because of "the true law of history."The truthis,
Jones thought,thatthe principlecaused Bede to turndeliberatelyaway from
a standard of literal fact and to writehistory"for no other than theological
reasons."7
This sharp revision, especially the claim that Bede had littleinterestin
factual history,has not won general acceptance. It was quickly criticizedby
BertramColgrave; in the recentbook of Giosue Musca it has again come into
question.8An uncontestedpart of the thesisis thatthe veralexhistoriaeof the
HE came, via In Lucam,entirelyfromJerome'sAdversusHelvidium.This is one
of the opinions that stillpreventsan adequate interpretationof Bede's view.
Another,held alike by Plummerand Jones,is thatin the prefaceof theHE, as
in the commentaryon Luke, the wordsveralexhistoriae
are a kind of technical
termsignifyingforBede the chiefprincipleof history.9Elsewhere I endorsed
these assumptions; here I shall registersome second thoughts.'0
First I want to show thatJerome, when he spoke of vera historiaelex, was
citinga rhetoricalrule to whichhe accorded only minorand rare importance
in interpretingthe Gospel narratives.It was only "a true law of history,"
certainlynot the main principleof all historiography.The words themselves
were not technical but polemical- contrived to embarrass Helvidius for
failing to recognize the textbook rule that explains why the Evangelists
momentarilydeparted fromthe actual factsabout Joseph. Then, in a second
section, I shall argue that Bede knew enough about rhetorical theory to
understandJerome'smeaning. A finalpart proposes thatBede's own veralex
historiae
(the one in theHE) was also nothingmore than"a truelaw of history,"
yet in all but words it was differentfrom Jerome's. It expressed certain
historiographicalideas that, on the one hand, authorized the use of oral
traditionswhose factualworthBede could not himselffullyjudge and, on the
forthe literaltruthto thisfamavulgans.The words
other,leftall responsibility
6 Ibid., p. 88.
7Ibid., p. 90.

8 See Colgrave's reviewofSaints'Livesin TheAmerican

HistoricalReview53 (1947-48), 528-529;
Beda (Bari, 1973), pp. 256-258.
Giosu6 Musca, Il Venerabile
9 See, in addition to the literaturecited above in notes 2, 5, and 8, James Campbell, "Bede," in
T. A. Dorey, ed., Latin Historians(New York, 1966), pp. 182-183; W. F. Bolton, A Historyof
597-1066, 1: 597-740 (Princeton,1967), pp. -173-174; Peter Hunter Blair,
Anglo-Latin
Literature,
Settimanedi studio del Centro
altomedievale,
"The HistoricalWritingsof Bede," in La storiografia
Italiano di Studi sull'Alto Medioevo 17, 1969 (Spoleto, 1970), 1:202; idem, The Worldof Bede
Historiog(London, 1970), pp. 78, 303; Robert A. Markus,Bede and theTraditionofEcclesiastiwal
raphy,JarrowLecture, 1975 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne,n. d.), pp. 11-12; Paul Meyvaert,"Bede the
Centenary
oftheThirteenth
Essaysin Commemoration
Scholar,"in Gerald Bonner, ed., FamulusChristi,
of theBirthof the VenerableBede (London, 1976), p. 67, n. 65; and Calvin B. Kendall, "Bede's
Historia ecclesiastica:The Rhetoric of Faith," in James J. Murphy, ed., Medieval Eloquence
(Berkeley, 1978), pp. 150-152.
10Roger Ray, "Bede, the Exegete, as Historian,"in Bonner, ed., FamulusChristi,pp. 129-130,
on Bede
135. What followsbelow I have summarized in a brief section of myForschungsbericht
Welt.
forthcomingin the series Aufstiegund Niedergangder r6mischen

Bede's VeraLex Historiae

veralexhistoriaeundoubtedlycame fromAdversusHelvidium,and clearlyBede

realized thattheywere not a technicaltermbut words thatone mightemploy
to signifyany true law of history.Like Jerome, he wrote them for rhetorical
emphasis, apparently to offsetwith strikinglanguage certain thingssaid by
Isidore of Seville.

Writtenin the 380s,AdversusHelvidiumdeMariae virginitate

perpetuaattacked
an obscure laymanof Rome who in a recentworkhad defended the parityof
the married and celibate lives by calling to account the central pro-celibacy
argument that Mary was always a virgin." It is one of Jerome's most selfconscious rhetoricalexhibitions.At the outset,after having implied that his
opponent's method had been nothingmore than forensicposturing,Jerome
proposes to make his own case not by artful pleading but by a superior
knowledge of the Bible.12 This turns out to be an empty promise, for
throughoutthe workJerome missesno rhetoricalchance. Toward the end he
admits it: "I have become rhetoricaland conducted myselfsomewhatin the
manner of a declaimer." And this too he blames on Helvidius.13
AdversusHelvidium"smells of the rhetorical school, Harald Hagendahl
once complained; J. N. D. Kelly has recentlysaid worse, thatJerome "travesties" Helvidius's views.14 The especially annoying feature of the tractis that
Jeromelikes to scorn the literacyof Helvidius - to laugh, forexample, at the
artlessnessof a "ridiculous exordium."'5 The campaign of derision suffuses
everything,even Jerome'suse of the words verahistoriae
lex. From the following sentence Bede took this term and other language for his comment on
Luke 2.33-34:
DeniqueexceptoJoseph,et Elisabeth,
et ipsa Maria,paucisqueadmodum,siquos ab
hisaudissepossumusaestimare,
omnesJesum
filiumaestimabant
Joseph;intantum,
ut etiamEvangelistaeopinionemvulgiexperimentes,
quae vera historiaelex est,
patremeum dixerintSalvatoris....16
This statementsupports one of Jerome's main arguments.Helvidius did not
question the virginbirth,but Jerome contends that by understandingwhat
the Gospel writersare doing when theycall Joseph the fatherof Jesus, one
sees what it means when theyspeak as ifJesus had natural brothers,or as -if
Mary were not a perpetual virgin.17
II PL 23:183-206. On thistreatiseand Helvidius, see J. N. D. Kelly,Jerome,
His Life,Writings,
and Controversies
(London, 1975), pp. 104-107. Helvidius's book is lost,aside fromthe tortured
excerpts from it given in AdversusHelvidium.
12 PL 23:185.
13 PL 23:206.

14Harald Hagendahl, TheLatinFathersand theClassics(Goteborg,1958), p. 284; Kelly,Jerome,

p.

107.
15

16

PL 23:200.
PL 23:187.

17PL 23:188.

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

ObviouslyJerome did not believe that the chief functionof historyis to

express the vulgaropinion. It would have been heresyto thinksuch a thingof
the biblical histories.Aside from this,"having long fancied himselfa historian,"18 Jerome knew verywell the correctrules of historiography.For him
the firstlaw of historywas to tellthe actual truth,and Bede would have known
thisfromJerome'spreface to his translationand continuationof Eusebius of
Caesarea's Chronicon.There Jerome promises that in a future work he will
reportthe timesof Gratian and Theodosius, and he postpones thisprojected
historyof the recentpast not because he fearsto write"freelyand truly"of the
living- "for the fear of God drives out the fear of man" - but because for
the moment the barbarians have made everythingso confusing.'9 This is a
Christian adaptation of the long standing Greco-Roman ideal of historical
truth. For Jerome the words vera historiaelex, as he uses them in Adversus
Helvidium,could not have conveyed the thoughtthat Bedan scholarshiphas
attached to their appearance in the preface of the HE.
The idea behind Jerome's words, though not the words themselves,came
fromthe rhetoricaldoctrineof probability.All his writingsshow thatJerome
was a great master of rhetoric.He learned his lessons from such works as
Cicero's De inventioneand Marius Victorinus's Explanationesin Ciceronis
rhetoricam,
a fourth-centurycommentaryon De inventione.20Both rhetors
taught that a forensic speech usually contains a narrative of the facts in
question and that this narratiomust possess the "virtues"of brevity,clarity,
and probability.2'An adequately "probable" narrativemakes everythingin
the story seem congruous, fitting,timely,coherent. It requires sufficient
informationabout persons, places, times,causes, and so on. It demands as
well some accommodation of public opinion, of what people thinkis true.22
On thisscore the NeoplatonistVictorinuswas especiallystrong,concerned as
he was withthe epistemologicaldistinctionbetweenknowledgeand opinion.23
At any rate, both he and Cicero make it plain thatthe rhetoricalrelevance of
popular belief does not spring from its objective truthbut strictlyfrom its
tactical value.24 The narrator may momentarilystate erroneous common
opinion if it is somehow congruous with other elements of his story.
These are Kelly's words, fromJerome,p. 170.
19Die Chronikdes Hieronymus,
ed. Rudolf Helm, in Eusebius'Werke,7, pt. 1, Die griechischen
christlicheSchriftsteller
der ersten drei jahrhunderte 24 (Leipzig, 1913), p. 7.
20
On Jerome's rhetoricaleducation, see Kelly,Jerome,pp. 10-16.
21 Cicero, De inventione
1.19.27-1.21.30; Victorinus,Explanationesin Ciceronisrhetoricam
1.191.21, ed. Charles Halm, Rhetoreslatiniminores(Leipzig, 1863), pp. 201-208. For the "virtuesof
narrative"in otherrhetors,see Heinrich Lausberg, Handbuchderliterarischen
1 (Munich,
Rhetorik,
1960), 168-184.
22 Cicero, De inventione
1.21.29: "Probabilis erit narratio,si in ea videbuntur inesse ea quae
solent apparere in veritate. . . si res et ad eorum qui agent naturam et ad vulgi morem et ad
eorum qui audient opinionem accommodabitur."
23 See Lausberg,Handbuch,1: 182 -183; and Pierre Hadot, Marius Victorinus:
Recherches
sursa vie
et ses oeuvres(Paris, 1971), pp. 47-58.
24 Victorinus,Explanationes1.21, in Halm, ed., Rhetores,
p. 207. Cf. Cicero's definitionof
probability(De inventione
1.29.46): "Probabile ... est id quod feresolet fieriaut quod in opinione
positum est aut quod in se ad haec quandam similitudinem,sive id falsum est sive verum."
Victorinus'sview of narratioprobabilisrests on this understandingof the probable.
18

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

The passage at issue in AdversusHelvidiumrests on this assumption.25

Jerometook forgrantedthatthe Evangelistshad remained alertto theclimate
of opinion at the various stages of the unfoldingdrama. In the early period
none but a few were aware that Mary had conceived of the Holy Spirit.The
restwent on thinkingthe usual thing,thata woman who gives birthhas lain
witha man. Among theJudean crowd the suggestionthatJoseph was not the
father of Jesus would have brought Mary's morals into question. So the
insiderskept quiet. If the Gospel writers,for theirpart, had not writtenthe
common view,theywould have made theirreaders wonder about the reputation of Mary. Since her public image was in fact good, it would have been
incongruous not to record the opinio vulgi about Joseph. Hence the
Evangelistsfollowedthe relevantrhetoricalprinciple: theysaid not what was
actually true but what fittedwithin the narrativecontext. "Expressing the
vulgar opinion, which is a true law of history,"theyspoke as thoughJoseph
were the fatherofJesus,and in like manner theyelsewhere made it seem that
lexrepresentsan exception to the
Mary had other children.This verahistoriae
main rule of history.It authorizesa briefstrategicdeparture fromthe normal
goal of factual truth.
The "virtuesof narratives"were used alike by ancient lawyersand historians. In his tracton writinghistory,Lucian assumed thatthe historianwould
give his work these qualities by the usual means.26Victorinusobserved that
the "virtues"prevailed in narrativesother than those used to plead cases, and
his one example was history:"In exposition historyought to be brief,clear,
and probable."27In thinkingthat historiansmust respect the conditions of
forensicnarrative,Jerome was on good ground indeed. But I daresay that
Adversus
Helvidiumis the onlyancienttextin whichit is suggested thatexpressingvulgaropinion is "a truelaw of history."Moreover,the oldest manuscript
of the tractdoes not include the clause "quae vera historiaelex est," which
makes one wonder whetherJeromehimselfwroteit.There can be littledoubt
that the clause appeared in the text known to Bede.28 If Jerome was the
author of these rather excessive words, then he must have set them down
withoutany thoughtof a formaland recognized list of legeshistoriae.Cicero
For what followssee PL 23:187-188.
Lucian, How to WriteHistory43, trans. Kenneth Kilburn, in Lucian, 6, Loeb (Cambridge,
Mass., 1959).
27
Victorinus,Explanationes1.20, in Halm, ed., Rhetores,p. 203.
28
The PL edition of the treatisereproduces D. Vallarsi's edition of 1734-1742, printed at
Verona. In a footnote (PL 23:187, n. 2) Vallarsi writes: "Isthaec, quae vera Historiaelex est,in
Veronensi ms. non habentur unde subdubito ex alio quam Hieronymicalamo profecisse."The
manuscripthere alluded to is Verona, Bibl. Capit. MS XVII(15), of the sixth century. Paul
Meyvaert,who has a microfilmof thismanuscript,has confirmedVallarsi's observation.For a list
of other manuscriptswiththistreatise,see B. Lambert,Bibliotheca
Hieronyma
Manuscripta,2 (The
Hague, 1969), 367-376. On p. 367 Lambert listsall the pre-tenth-century
manuscripts,of which
thereare ten,includingthe Verona manuscript.Paul Meyvaertreportsto me thatat least seven of
these manuscriptshave the phrase about veralexhistoriae.
This suggeststhatthe phrase was added
at a very early date - possibly as a result of Jerome's revising his own text- and that the
manuscriptused by Bede in all likelihoodalready contained it. It is apparent fromthisinformation that a new criticaledition of the AdversusHelvidiumis needed.
25

26

Bede's VeraLex Historiae

spoke of "laws of history,"but he had in mind the fewprinciplesthatworked

for impartial truth and certainlynot the rhetoricallicense that sometimes
permittednarratorsto make a tacticaluse of erroneous vulgar opinion.29
Clearly the clause "quae vera historiae lex est" was meant above all for
rhetoricalimpact,to taunt Helvidius again for not having learned his lessons
in the higher education. A self-respectinggraduate of the rhetoricalschool
would have taken umbrage if someone had presumed to remind him of
somethingso routinelytaughtas the rules of rhetoricalprobability.It would
have stung all the more to be told pompously that this theory applied to
history.The affrontwould have been great for a writerlike Helvidius, who
had just published a tractdealing in partwiththe rhetoricof biblicalnarrative.
Thus whenJerome "explains" a rule of history,his intentionis not even civil,
let alone edifying.It is as if he had said that the Evangelistsaccommodated
theirstoryto opinio vulgi because, as any schoolboyknows,all good narrators
do.
On the technicallevel Jerome'svera historiaelex was an appeal to a recognized featureof realisticiiarrativeand, more generally,to the acknowledged
interconnectionof rhetoricand history.It was, however,plainlynot a technical term,understoodas tied alwaysto a single meaning.The wordsthemselves
sprang entirelyfromscorn,fromthe desire to buryHelvidius under a weight
of emphatic language. They were a contrivance that would have served
equally well to stressany other legitimateprincipleof history,and because of
this adaptabilitytheyappear in the preface of the HE. In any case, Adversus
Helvidium does not teach that "it was the chief functionof historyto record
whatordinarypeople believe,"nor does it plead for"a truthwhichdenies the
literalstatementor uses the literalstatementto achieve an image in whichthe
literal statementis itselfincongruous."30
II
Bede wroteIn Lucam long beforetheHE.31 For his commenton 2.33 -34 he
took materialboth fromJerome and fromAugustine'sDe consensuEvangelistarum, a mainstayof his patristiclibrary.In De consensu Augustine also observes, without any reference to narrative theory, that common opinion
caused the New Testament writersto speak as though Marywere not a virgin.
Yet he especiallystressesthat since Joseph adopted the son of his only wife,
instead of the child of some other woman, he was Jesus's fatherin more than
an adoptive sense. This point Bede linked to what he got fromJerome.32The
Cicero, Epistulaeadfamiliares5.12.3.
The firstquotation is fromHunter Blair, "The HistoricalWritingsof the Venerable Bede,"
p. 202, the second fromJones, Saints'Lives, p. 83.
31 Between 709 and 716; theHE was apparentlyfinishedin 731, except perhaps forthe preface
and the autobiographical conclusion. See M. L. W. Laistner,A Hand-Listof Bede Manuscripts
(Ithaca, N.Y., 1943), pp. 44, 94.
32
Augustine,De consensuEvangelistarum
2.1.2-3, CSEL 43. Cf. Bede, In Lucam 1, lines 19111918.
29

30

Bede's VeraLex Historiae

great part of Bede's briefexpositioncame fromAdversusHelvidium."Patrem

salvatorisappellat [Evangelista] loseph non quo vere iuxta Fotinianos pater
fueriteius sed quo ad famam Mariae conservandam pater sit ab omnibus
aestimatus."33In AdversusHelvidiumthe same thought,in much the same
words but without the mention of the Photinians,34lies several sentences
beyond the statementfromwhichBede drew the crux of his nextobservation:
"Neque enim oblitus evangelista quod eam spiritu sancto concepisse et virginem peperisse narraritsed opinionem vulgi exprimensquae vera historiae
lex est patrem loseph nuncupat Christi." From "opinionem" onward the
words are basicallyJerome's.35
Did Bede understandthem?I have no doubt thathe possessed the fulltext
ofAdversus
Helvidium,notjust excerptsthatmighthave caused him to missthe
fullforceofJerome'srhetoricalcampaign. In hisExpositioActuumApostolorum,
which was completed some years before the work on Luke, Bede skillfully
compressed an argumentthatruns throughmore than three columns of the
PatrologiaLatina edition ofJerome'spolemic.36One of his Christmassermons
In general Bede was not a passive copyist;
Helvidium.37
is fairlyfullofAdversus
several studies now show that it was his career-long habit to appropriate
secondhand materialonlyafterhavingunderstood it.38An intelligentreading
of AdversusHelvidiumwould have required comprehension of the section
lex. One of the work'smajor arguments
whichcontainsJerome'sverahistoriae
begins there, and on a late page Jerome refers back to this place on the
assumptionthatthe reader willlong since have gottena centralpoint.39Bede's
commrenton Luke 2.33-34 joins the two sentences that catch the nub of
Jerome's rhetoricalargument. He seems to have known exactly where the
main ideas lay.
Bede could not have thoughtthat the great rule of biblical historywas to
record the vulgarview,nor thatsuch an idea ever crossedJerome'smind. But
I am sure too thatBede had enough rhetoricalsophisticationto grasp the true
meaning of Jerome'sverahistoriaelex. One passage fromtheExpositioActuum
- in which work, as I
have noted, he used Adversus
Apostolorum
Helvidium will sufficeto show it. In this place Bede expounds part of a
courtroomnarrative,the recitalof Hebrew historythattakes up nearlyall of
Stephen's speech before theJerusalemcouncil of scribesand elders who were
33In Lucam 1, lines 1905-1908.
34 PL 23: 188.
35 In Lucam 1, lines 1908 -1911. Cf. PL 23:187.
36Bede, ExpositioActuumApostolorum
et retractatio,
ed. M. L. W. Laistner (Cambridge, Mass.,
1939), p. 11. Cf. AdversusHelvidium,PL 23:195-198.
37 Bedae Venerabilis
homeliarum
Evangelii libriduo 1.5, CCSL 122. The editor, David Hurst,
Helvidium,but fromline 14 onward the ideas and much of the
ascribesonlya fewlines toAdversus
language show that Bede wrote the sermon withJerome's work in his hands.
38 Robert B. Palmer, "Bede as a Textbook Writer:A Study of hisDe artemetrica,"
SPECULUM 34
(Cambridge, Mass., 1943), pp.
(1959), 573-584; Charles,W. Jones, Bedae opera de temporibus
125-129; idem, "Some IntroductoryRemarks on Bede's Commentaryon Genesis,"Sacriserudiri
19 (1969-70), 115-198; Paul Meyvaert,"Bede the Scholar," pp. 42-44.
39 PL 23:201.

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

tryinghim for blasphemyagainst the holy place and the law.40In theRetractatioin ActusApostolorum,
writtenabout thirtyyears afterthe Expositio,Bede
praises in general Stephen's "ars loquendi," his or-atoricalskill. He says in
particularthatthe martyrwas shrewdto have begun in a moderate vein, so as
to prepare the audience to listen at some length.4' This remark continues a
line of rhetorical thought established long before in the Expositio,in the
commenton Acts 7.16. The verse contained a factualdetail thatwas irreconcilable withcertaintextsin Genesis. Stephen gave the wrong burial place for
Jacob; he used informationfromGenesis 33.19, whichhas nothingto do with
the question,instead of the clear testimonyof 23.3-20 and 49.29-33. Since it
would have been unthinkableto attributethe error to Stephen or Luke, Bede
laid the blame on "opinio vulgi":
VerumbeatusStephanusvulgoloquensvulgimagisin dicendosequituropinionem;
historiae
nontamordinemcircumstantis
duas enimpariternarrationes
coniungens,
adversuslocum
quam causamde qua agebaturintendit.Qui eniminsimulabatur
sanctumet legem docuisse,pergitostenderequomodo lesus Christusex lege
monstretur
esse promissuset quod ipsi nec tuncMoysinec dominonuncservire
maluerint.42

The language - "causam de qua agebatur," "insimulabatur,""ostendere,"

"monstretur"- fitsthe courtroom. The members of the Jerusalem council
are said to be vulgar presumablybecause theirknowledgeof Scripturewas not
entirelyerudite. In any case, Bede argues thatStephen did whatthe oratorical
occasion demanded. The martyrkeptin mind twonarratives,his own and one
thatwas fixedin opinion. His purpose was not to correctincidentaldetailsthat
had no materialbearingon the main purpose of the speech. To riskoffending
the audience on the wrongpoint,on a question farsmallerthan the one really
at issue, would have been poor strategy.When on minor mattersthe two
narrativesdiverged, there was no sense in preferringthe actual "ordo historiae"ifthe truthitselfmighthave caused a bog of factualdoubt in the midst
of the discourse. Hence, since Stephen was afterall speaking to the "vulgar,"
he followed"withall the more reason" (magis)the common opinion about the
momentarytopic of Jacob's grave site and hastened on undeterred to sound
the fullthunderof his major claim. The errorwas actuallythe audience's, and
Stephen repeated it for benign rhetoricalreasons.
Not entirelysatisfiedwiththissolution to the factualproblem,Bede wrote:
"This I have said as best I can withoutprejudice for a betteropinion, should
one come along."43This uneasy remarkmakes itcertainthathe fashionedthe
exegesis of Acts 7.16 on his own, fromhis own knowledgeof the possible place
of opinioin a forensicnarrative.From AdversusHelvidiumBede could have
40Expositio ActuumApostolorum
et retractatio,
pp.

32-33.

Ibid., p. 118.
42
Ibid., pp. 32-33.
43 "Haec, ut potui, dixi, non praeiudicans sententiaemeliorisi adsit." Ibid., p. 33. The Retractatio(see p. 131) shows that a betteropinion never arrived.
41

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

extrapolated the principle that a truthfulnarrator may sometimes make a

tacticaluse of vulgar opinion even if it is false. But no amount of inference
fromJerome'svera historiaelex could have equipped him to manipulate this
traitof "probable" narrativein a forensicway. He handled the courtroom
language and rhetoricaltheorywith aplomb, as if he had learned it from
literaturethat directlydeals in it.
The general scholarly view is that the library at Monkwearmouth and
Jarrowheld no rhetoricalmanual other than Isidore of Seville'sEtymologiae,
of Cassiodorus,
Book Two. Perhaps the abbey owned a copy of theInstitutiones
but thisis far fromcertain.44At any rate, neitherwork explains the function
of "opinion" in narratioprobabilis.The recent critical edition of Bede's De
ettropis,and De artemetricashows thathe consulted
De schematibus
orthographia,
at firsthand more than twentygrammarsand grammarians.45If in all their
apparent zeal to multiplygrammarsBenedict Biscop and Ceolfrid,the great
builders of the abbey library,bothered to collect fromall theirtravelsto the
continentnot one rhetor other than Isidore, one certainlywonders why. A
generation after Bede Cicero's De inventioneseems to have been vigorously
studied at York.46Bede's exegesis of Acts 7.16 amplyillustratesthatmonastic
scholarscould put some aspects of forensicrhetoricto good use indeed. The
commentson thistextand on Luke 2.33-34 involvedmajor doctrinalissues:
on the one hand, the reliabilityof scripturalhistory;on the other,the virgin
birth of Jesus. Surely Bede gave his own students an introductionto the
rhetoricalthought necessaryto protectthe faith.
A passage from Bede's commentaryon Samuel suggests that his library
contained pagan works that were, as we might say, classifiedmaterials,intended only for the eyes of authorized persons and not for general reading.
The eruditusmightprofitfrom them in his own private study,discuss them
cautiouslyin the classroom,or apply thingsfromthem in his works,probably
withoutquotations or citations,but he would not have allowed unattended
persons to inspect these books, for fear of seeing them confused by, for
example, the "Ciceronianism"thatonce putJerome in peril of his soul. In the
treatiseon Samuel, reflectingon Jerome's Letter 22 and in factquoting the
famous words - "non christianus,sed Ciceronianus" - of the dream it relates, Bede entered the usual Christiandemurrersabout the heathen literature but immediatelyadded thatthe highlylearned may use it to avoid error
44 Laistner's list of the books known to Bede stillreflectsthe prevailingview of his rhetorical
HeritageoftheEarlyMiddle
reading: see "The Libraryof the Venerable Bede," in his TheIntellectual
Ages (Ithaca, N.Y., 1957), pp. 117-159, which firstappeared in Thompson, ed., Bede pp. 237266. In the firstvolume of a new edition of Bede's school treatises,Charles Jones, the principal
was "probably"at Wearmouthand Jarrow;see Bede,
editor,statesthatCassiodorus'sInstitutiones
Operadidascalica,1, CCSL 123A, p. 2. But if a workso congenial to Bede's purposes had been in
the abbey library,would it not have leftunmistakabletraces in his writings?
45 Operadidascalica,1:2, Here Jones giveshis listof grammaticalliterature"certainly"
or "almost
certainly"known to Bede; another eight items are said to have been "probably" or "possibly"
available.
46 Peter Hunter Blair, "From Bede to Alcuin," in Bonner, ed., Famulus Christi,
p. 253.

10

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

(as he did in the commenton Acts 7.16). Indeed the teacher who effectively
rules his pupils "believes thathe mustsometimesbe helped by the arguments
and opinions [argumentissive sententiis]of the gentiles."47What were these
dangerous but valuable pagan works? The nature of Jerome's letter and
Bede's reference to "arguments and opinions" suggest the rhetors.
Direct quotations are not the only index to Bede's knowledge of classical
sivesententiae
is certainlyanother,
literature.His practiceof pagan argumenta
though it may not always lead to a specific text. If his works contain no
his unmistakableapplifirsthandborrowingsfrom,say,Cicero'sDe inventione,
cation of a forensicprinciplein the commenton Acts 7.16 proves thathe was
not entirelycut offfromancientrhetoricalthought.I am sure thatfairlyearly
in his career, before he wrotethe expositionof Acts,not to mentionIn Lucam,
Bede knew the correctrhetoricalrole of vulgar opinion. When he excerpted
Adversus
Helvidiumforhis interpretationof Luke 2.33 -34, he learned nothing
new about whatJerome calls vera historiaelex. He copied these words intoIn
Lucam withoutexplanatoryremark or the mention of his patristicauthority.
Apparentlyhe assumed that theirrhetoricalmeaning would come readilyto
the reader's mind - which says somethingabout the monastic curriculum.
From all his biblical studies Bede would have concluded that historians
ought to write from the best sources. In his comment on Luke 1.1-4 he
emphasizes thatthe Evangelists,unlike the writersof apocrypha,spoke "veritas historiae"not onlybecause of theirinspirationbut also because of eyewitHe realized thatthe sacred historianspracticedtheircraft
ness information.48
withsome didactic freedom.49Throughout his workas an exegete, however,
Bede took for granted that the biblical narratorsgave actual factson good
authority.In the rare instanceswhen details were clearlywrong,it was always
because the scripturalauthors had reason to express the vulgar opinion.50 It
was, of course,imperativeto knowwhythe writersoccasionallydeparted from
the truthof historyin thisway. Yet for both Jerome and Bede the rhetorical
rule thatcaused the biblicalnarratorsto take the mistakenpopular viewwas a
seldom practiced and altogetherminor principle of biblical history.It could
not have become the major premise of the HE.

III
The truthis thatwhen Bede used the termveralexhistoriaein the commentaryon Luke and thenagain in the prefaceof theHE, nothingremainedin the
second instancebut the words.The meaning had completelychanged. He was
stilltalkingabout a true law of history,but therewas no thoughtof rhetorical
probability.In the prefacethetruelaw of historyrespectedthe factualbasis of
edifyingnarrative.It was in fact the antithesisof Jerome's vera historiaelex,
Bede, In primampartemSamuhelislibriquattuor2, lines 2173-2196, CCSL 119.
Bede, In Lucam 1, lines 12-56.
49 See Ray, "Bede," pp. 129-132.
50In Lucam 2, lines 1905-1911; ExpositioActuumApostolorum
et retractatio,
pp. 32-33, 57-58,
131 -132.
47

48

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

11

which authorized the momentarystrategicuse of informationknown to be

which appears only in the
patentlyfalse. As for Bede's own vera lexhistoriae,
HE, it contained historiographicalideas that were exemplified in several
available works, one of them pagan. Bede wrote the words, it seems, with
Isidore of Seville mainlyon his mind, notJerome,though he surelytook the
term itselffromAdversusHelvidium.
The preface is built upon the exordial topoi that came into Christian
historiographyfromclassical literature.51In the conventionalway Bede first
addresses a friendlyreader, King Ceolwulf of Northumbria,and triesto put
him in a docile mood.52Withinthiscommonplace he sets another,thatof the
At the end of the address to Ceolwulf,Bede turnsto
moral utilityof history.53
a larger audience and develops at lengththe topos of sources.54It affirmshis
and forexactlythisreason subsumes hisveralexhistoriae.
Then
own credibility,
he finishesthe preface withthe topical statementof authorialmodesty,asking
prayers that God take pity on "the weaknesses both of mind and body" in
the separate prose lifeof
whichhe has worked.55To an earlierbook ofhistoria,
St. Cuthbert,Bede affixeda preface written,as he remarks,"iuxta morem."56
Whatevermay have been his literarymodels, he practicedthe Latin exordial
mores rather well. The preface of the HE is a skillfulweb of long-standing
commonplaces, and they all functionin the traditionalway.
There is genuine sentimentin them. Clearly Bede hoped that Ceolwulf
would measure himselfby "the famous men of our nation," especially the
godly Northumbriankingsof the seventhcentury.57The statementof humilityreflectslife- when he wrote the preface, Bede was an old and perhaps
sick man.58The sheer size of the discussion of sources is an idiosyncracy.If
see the helpful
51 For the prefatorycommonplaces of ancient and medieval historiography,
(Tubingen,
Geschichtswerke
surveysof Elmar Herkommer,Die Topoiin denProomienderrbmischen
1968), and Gertrud Simon, "Untersuchungenzur Topik der Widmungsbriefemittelalterlicher
4 (1958), 52-119,
bis zum Ende des 12. Jahrhunderts,"ArchivfiirDiplomatik
Geschichtsschreiber
and continued in 5-6 (1959-60), 73-153.
etc. Herkommer,
52 HE Praef., p. 2: "Gloriosissimoregi Ceoluulfo Beda famulus Christi...,"
Die Topoi, pp. 22-34; Simon, "Untersuchungen,"pt. 1, pp. 54-86.
etc. Herkommer,Die Topoi,
53 HE Praef., P. 2: "Sive enim historiade bonis bona referat...,"
pp. 128-135; Simon, "Untersuchungen,"pt. 2, pp. 94-112.
54 HE Praef., p. 2: "Ut autem in his quae scripsi vel tibi vel ceteris auditoribus sive lectoribus
huius historiaeoccasionem dubitandi subtraham . . .," etc. Herkommer,Die Topoi,pp. 86-102;
Simon, "Untersuchungen,"pt. 2, pp. 89-94 and pt. 1, pp. 87-98.
55 HE Praef.,p. 6: "Praeterea omnes .. . legentessive audientes suppliciterprecor,ut pro meis
et mentiset corporis . . .," etc. Herkommer,Die Topoi,pp. 52-59; Simon, "Unterinfirmitatibus
suchungen," pt. 1, pp. 109-117.
auctoreBeda Praef., ed. Bertram Colgrave, Two Lives of Saint Cuthbert
56 Vita Sancti Cuthberti
(1939; repr., New York, 1969), p. 142.
57 See J. M. Wallace-Hadrill, "Gregory of Tours and Bede: Their Views on the Personal
Studien2 (1968), 31-44; repr.,idem,EarlyMedievalHistory
Qualities of Kings,"Friihmittelalterliche
(London, 1976), pp. 96-1114.
58 The preface was written
at some timeafterthe narrative,whichends in 731, was finished,as
is clear fromHE Praef., p. 2. Bede was too ill to travelin the autumn of 734 (see his Epistolaad
ed. Plummer,Opera historica,1:405) and died the next year.
Ecgbertum,

Bede's VeraLex Historiae

12

one can judge frompublished surveysof the exordial rhetoricin ancientand

theHE is highlyunusual in the amount of space and
medieval historiography,
detail it givesto thiscommonplace.59For mostLatin writersa fewsentencesof
general commentwere enough. In the latestedition of theHE the topos fills
two pages with impressivelyspecificand comprehensive informationabout
sources. Bede did not go to all thistrouble"iuxta morem."A more immediate
purpose must have prompted him.
Beginning with his information about the English church below the
Humber, Bede emphasizes thatall his southern materials,including what he
calls "traditioseniorum" and "traditiopriorum," came to him through the
mediation of good and sometimeserudite ecclesiasticalhelpers.60He mentions them, some by name. Abbot Albinus of Canterbury, a man "most
learned in all things,"had been the preeminentsource, "auctor ante omnes."
in the
Through his aid Bede had even been able to studyKentishChristianity
days of the Gregorian missionaries partly, though indirectly, from
"monimenta litterarum,"reliable writteninformation.A priest of London
named Nothelm,under the guidance of Albinus, had gone abroad to search
the papal archives for Roman sources relevantto Augustine's mission. Bede
cites others who had put him in touch with the South - Bishop Daniel of
Winchester,an East Anglian abbot called Esi, the monks of Lastingham,
Bishop Cynibertof Lindsey, and "other faithfulmen." The point is that the
southern informationwas responsibly,even officially,gathered.
For the historyof the North there were "innumerable faithfulwitnesses"
who eitherknew fromactual experience or somehow remembered the facts.
Overseeing the northern research was an eruditus,Bede himself; for the
region above the Humber he played the role thatAlbinus had performedfor
the South. Of course Bede followed his own personal knowledge of Northumbria, things "which I myselfhave been able to learn." The life of St.
Cuthbert,a great desideratum,he took mainlyfrom the authorized Lindisfarnevita. He read it,as he says,"simpliciterfidemhistoriae... accomodans,"
as if the volume were unalterablytrue. Bede explains thathe had augmented
it,as before in the separate prose lifeof the saint,fromhis own knowledgeor
people.
the testimonyof trustworthy
On the whole the long topos of sources says more by far about reliable
informantsand respectablewritteninformationthan about common report.
It reflects,indeed displays,an awarenessof the kindsof sources thathistorians
were supposed to prefer. Yet Bede does not leave the impression that his
narrativerestsin the main on eyewitnessaccounts and credible writingswhose
truthhe could personallyrecognize. In a deeply feltstatementhe concludes
the topos with the acknowledgment that a large part of his source
material- no doubt including most of what he got from Albinus and the
other identifiedcontributors- was "fama vulgans,"oral traditionthe factual
the literaturecited above, note 54.
For the followingsee HE Praef., pp. 2-6.

59 See
60

Bede's VeraLex Historiae

13

quality of which he was himself in a poor position to judge. I offer the

followingrevision of Colgrave's translation:
he
I humblyimplorethereaderthathe notimputeitto me ifin whatI havewritten
I
otherthanthetruth.For,in accordancewitha truelawof history,
findsanything
havetriedto setdownin a simplestylewhatI havecollectedfromcommonreport,
of posterity.6'
fortheinstruction
This vera lex historiaecannot mean "thetrue law of history,"for it is clearly
subordinateto veritas,the governingideal of the topos of sources. It is equally
clear thatthis"truth"respectsfactualaccuracyand thatthe disclaimerlodged
in hisveralexhistoriae
applies to factualerror.Bede would never have thought
that a veteran Christianteacher mightdisown theological and moral errors
repeated even innocentlyin a writtenwork. When he published the HE, he
was confidentthatin one sense it was true throughout- true to the Catholic
faith,Roman obedience, and the practice of the Christianlife. It makes no
differencethatBede wanted his narrativeto edify,nor thathe loved to record
miracle stories.In a long traditionof historicalwriting,he thoughtthat one
gives moral lessons only fromevents that reallytook place, and he believed,
based on a Christianconception of historicalreality,thatsaintlywonders are
undoubtedly among the things that actually happen.62 History was, by
definition,a narrativeof "literal"deeds and words, events reported "secundum litteram."63
For Bede, as forJerome,the true law of historywas to write
instructivefactual narrative,whetherof kings or of saints.
was a related but differentrule. It recognized thatBede
His veralexhistoriae
had no choice but to workfromsources thathe could not always,or even very
often,personallyappraise. Eyewitnesstestimonywas but a small part of his
materials;besides,the closer he came to his own day, when firsthandwitnesses
would have been most helpful,the less he wrote.Of writtensources he seems
to have had shortsupply: some regnal and episcopal lists,a fewletters,certain
conciliardocuments,a small number of hagiographicalvitae,perhaps annals
writtenon Easter tables, a half dozen or so works of largely peripheral
interest,like Orosius's Historiae,and littleelse.64Through most of his narraIbid., pp. 6-7.
van de
interpretatie
From a broad knowledge of Bede's works,Jan Davidse, Beda Venerabilis'
(Groningen, 1976), pp. 22-54, has argued thata Christianviewof historical
historische
werkelijkheid
reality,quite apart fromshiftingattentionawayfromconcreteexperience,reinforcedan interestin
actual facts. Central to Bede's notion of history,Davidse says, is the assumption that a useful
is one thatdepictseventsthatreallytook place. For ifworthydeeds once happened, they
exemplum
could, throughimitation,happen again. Secularized, thisbeliefwas familiarto classicalpractitioners of "exemplary"historiography.Bede's most vigorousaffirmationof factualhistorylies in the
Praef.,ed. Colgrave,Two
prefaceto his separate prose lifeof St. Cuthbert;see VitaSanctiCuthberti
Lives,pp. 142-146.
63 Bede, De tabernaculo1, lines 784-785, CCSL 119A: "Historia namque est cum res aliqua
quomodo secundum litteramfactasive dicta sitplano sermone refertur...." The factualbasis of
1.41.1- 2,
history,as I shallpresentlyshow,was rigorouslystressedbyIsidore of Seville,Etymologiae
1.44.4-5. For him narrativethatlacked factual substance wasfabula.or argumentum.
64 See Colgrave's summaryof Bede's writtensources in HE, pp. xxxi-xxxiv.
61
62

14

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

tive Bede wrotefama vulgantebecause there was no other way. Some of his
common reportwas more than a centuryold; the whole body of it was seldom
if ever verifiable.65Bede believed, as the last paragraph of the preface emphasizes, that thefama was "worthyof memory"and accepted as true in its
nativeregions.66As I shall stressagain in a moment,he was satisfiedthatthe
common reportwas trustworthy
so far as responsibleecclesiasticalmen could
say. Shaped withoutinternalchange into a larger narrativedesign, the traditions were acceptable to give the English people some firstlessons in their
ecclesiasticalhistory.By the standardsof Latin historiography,
however,Bede
could not himselfpretend to know whetherthefamawas fullytrue to fact.To
confirmit there were neithereyewitnessesnor sober works.Bede would not
have writtenfromcommon reportif there had not been good precedent for
doing so. He feltsure thatthe received genre of historyauthorized the use of
unprovable oral traditions,better sources failing,so long as he made no
personal commitment to their factual truth. This was his, though not
Jerome's,vera lex historiae.Withinthe topos of sources, it permittedhim to
embrace unverifiablepopular informationwithoutcalling into question his
own respect for the ideal of truth.
For Jerome and Bede the words "true law of history"meant different
things, but on the rhetorical level both writers used them in the same
way- to draw strikingattentionto historiographicalnotions that were urgentlyimportant.Bede's "law" was a combinationof long-establishedpremises. The disclaimerfixedin it was a classicalidea availableto him in at least two
places. The first,a late pagan work, was Julius Solinus's Collectanearerum
which was a minor source for Bede's De
oftencalled Polyhistor,
memorabilium,
ratione(725) and the firstbook of theHE .67 The second wasJerome's
temporum
versionof Eusebius's Chronicon,
which Bede used in many connections.Both
Solinus and Eusebius take an attitude that was, according to Seneca, widespread among ancient historians.When theycannot be sure of theirinformation,historiansalways say,wroteSeneca, "Liabilityfor the truthshall lie with
the sources."68Clearly Bede's vera lexhistoriaeleaves all responsibilityfor the
factual truthto sources of which he could not be altogethersure. Now the
writingof historyfrom oral traditionswas practiced by so many Christian
authors familiarto Bede (Gregorythe Great and Gregoryof Tours, to name
just two) thatit would hardlyseem to have needed any defense. He gives his
vera lex historiaewithoutexplanation or the mention of an authority,as if it
65
On theoral traditionssee David P. Kirby,"Bede's NativeSources fortheHistoriaEcclesiastica,"
BulletinoftheJohnRylandsLibrary48 (1966), 341-371.
66
HE Praef.,p. 6: ". . . qui de singulisprovinciissive locis sublimioribus,quae memoratudigna
atque incolis grata credideram,diligenteradnotare curavi...."
67 Jones,Bedae operade temporibus,
pp. 239, 245; HE 1.1, note 1, p. 14.
68 Seneca, Naturalesquaestiones
4.3.1: "Penes auctores fides erit." Cf. Solinus, Collectanearerum
memorabilium
Praef.,ed. Theodor E. Mommsen (Berlin, 1895), p. 2: ". . . constantiaveritatispenes
eos est,quos secutisumus." Eusebius leaves the reader to decide the truthof some of his informaed. Helm, p. 9. For
tion: "Verum utcumque quis volet,computet."See Die ChronikdesHieronymus,
furtherexamples of thisattitude,see Simon, "Untersuchungen,"pt. 1, pp. 87-98.

15

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

were well established.Yet he statesit withemphaticand cautious words,as if

the pointwere somehow in question. And it comes, as I have already noted,at
the end of a topos that Bede took to extraordinarylengths,as if his own
authorial truthfulnesswere under some threat. All this he does, I believe,
whichcontainsthe onlydiscusbecause of whatis said in Isidore'sEtymologiae,
sion of the genre of historycertainlyknownto have been in the abbey library.
Commentingon historiography,Isidore affirmsthe ideal of factual truth
withunprecedented rigor.69Historiais unlikefabula, he says,because it narratesreal events,or, as he remarksin a slightlylater section,"true eventsthat
which
reallyhappened."70 The word historycomes fromthe Greek historein,
means to see and comprehend. Therefore historyproper is a record of events
literallywithinsightof the narratorhimself.Apparentlycarriedaway withthe
etymology,and in a style that the following translationtries to preserve,
Isidore explains:
excepthe whotookpartin and saw
For amongtheancientsno one wrotehistory
whathe recorded.Foritis bettertodiscoverbyseeingthantocollectbyhearing.For
thingsthatare seen are publishedwithoutlying.7'
On thisshowingany historybut what one writesfrompersonal experience is
not worth the risk.
The "gaucherie" of the repeated "for" (enim) is only one thing that led
Jacques Fontaine to decide that the stringentemphasis on autopsy was Isidore's own accent.72I need hardlypoint out thatthe remarkabout the veteres
shows how littleIsidore knew about them.What would have astonished Bede
is thateven the biblicalnarrativesdo not alwaysfitIsidore's definitionof ideal
history.It excludes, for thatmatter,nearlyall the historiographicalliterature
known to Bede. In any event, he knew that there was more to the genre of
historythan Isidore allows. On Isidore's strictterms,none of Bede's historical
works(or Isidore's) could have been written.The HE would have been simply
unthinkable.
There may well be an interplaybetween Isidore's discussion and Bede's
sentence that contains vera lex historiae:
ISIDORE

BEDE

Apud veteresenimnemoconscribebat Lectoremquesuppliciterobsecro ut,

nisiis qui interfuisset,
et ea siqua in his quae scripsimusaliter
historiam,
quae conscribendaessent vidisset. quam se veritas habet posita repMeliusenimoculisquae fiuntdepre- pererit,non hoc nobis inputet,qui,
hendimus,quam quae auditionecol- quod veralex historiaeest,simpliciter
legimus. Quae enim videntur,sine ea quae famavulgantecollegimusad
69Etymologiae
1.41.1-2.
70
71

Ibid., 1.44.5.
Ibid., 1.41.1-2.

1 (Paris, 1959),
72 Jacques Fontaine,IsidoredeSevilleetla culture
classiquedansl'Espagnewisigothique,
180-183.

16

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

mendacio proferuntur.Haec disci- instructionem
posteritatis
litteris
manplina pertinetad Grammaticam,
quia dare studuimus.73
quidquid memoriadignumest litteris
mandatur.

Isidore leaves the impression that oral sources of informationare all but
illegitimate,contraryto the rule of historical truth,and that anyone who
writesfrom them is likelyto be a liar. Bede asserts that the historianis not
personally at fault if, "quod vera lex historiae est," he sets down edifying
thingsfromcommon report and in so doing unwittinglyrepeats errorsconcealed in his sources. Isidore's "quae [fiunt]auditione collegimus"functionsto
discourage what Bede's "ea quae fama vulgante collegimus" provisionally
endorses, and the two authors use even more similar words, "litterismandatur" and "litterismandare," in connection with widely differingviews of
whatis worthyof writtenrecord. The opposition of ideas makes the similarity
of language and syntaxall the more interesting.
However much Bede owed to him,he was manytimesat odds withIsidore,
and the animus seems to have grown progressivelystronger. Two of his
earliesttracts,De temporibusand De natura rerum,were writtenpartlyto correct
or replace thingssaid by his Spanish forerunner,though Bede never names
him. In two major worksfromthe last decade of his life,Bede calls Isidore's
name forthe firsttimesever,and in each of these threeinstancesitis to refute
him, once withsome scorn. At thisstage he also continued to correctIsidore
withoutmentioninghim,as I believe he does in the letterto Ceolwulf.74Then
occasional criticismgave way to sternpolemic in Bede's last days and weeks.
Cuthbert, a former student who wrote what is generally accepted as an
eyewitnessaccount of Bede's finalillnessand death, reportsthatnear the end
his masterwas so set against certaincontentsof Isidore's De natura rerumthat
he used flaggingenergies to finish"quasdam exceptiones, dicens 'Nolo ut
pueri mei mendacium legant, et in hoc post meum obitum sine fructulaborent'." The angry words ascribed to Bede - "I do not want my studentsto
read a lie and to waste efforton this book afterI am gone" - make it plain
that Cuthberttook "exceptiones" in the classical sense, to mean exceptions,
not excerpts, contrary to what scholars from Mabillon to Colgrave have
thought.75Cuthbertclaims thatBede completed a Latin opusculumintendedat
least to steer his pupils away fromthe "lie" in Isidore's De natura rerum,if not
73Etymologiae
1.41.1-2; HE Praef., p. 6.

74 For detailsabout Bede's attitudetowardIsidore, see Laistner,"The Libraryof the Venerable

pp. 131-132; and esp. Meyvaert,"Bede the
Bede," pp. 138-139; Jones,Bedae operade temporibus,
Scholar," pp. 58-60. Bede criticizesIsidore by name twice in the Retractatioon Acts (Expositio
ratione(ed. Jones,Bedae opera
etretractatio,
pp. 96, 145) and once in De temporum
Actuum
Apostolorum
de temporibus,
p. 247); in the last case the scorn comes out.
75 See EpistolaCuthberti
de obituBedae, mostrecentlyed. Colgrave and printedas an appendix to
HE, pp. 580-586; for the commentabout Isidore, p. 582. The translationis mine. Meyvaert,in
"Bede the Scholar," p. 59, was the firstscholar to publish a correctreading of Cuthbert'swords
de obituBedae: A Caveat,"
about Bede's polemic against Isidore. W. F. Bolton, "EpistolaCuthberti
n. s. 1 (1970), 127-139, has argued thatCuthbert'sletteris poor evidence
Mediaevaliaethumanistica,
for the biographyof Bede. Bolton's case against the Epistolais not convincing.

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

17

is now
to quash the whole book. It is not surprisingthat thisliberexceptionum
official
of
an
that
almost
was
lost, for Isidore's eighth-centuryreputation
Doctor of the Church. Bede attacked his errors preciselybecause his works
were everywhere.
Bede wrotetheHE during the same decade when his long-standingskepticism about Isidore sank into apparent bitterness.Hence if the preface veils a
quarrel withthe encyclopedist,thistimeabout the genre of history,itcertainly
fitsinto an increasinglycharged attitudinalcontext.No doubt some, probably
many, of Bede's public had read the Etymologiaeon historiography.The
discussion would have been nearlyunavoidable; it comes in the long section
on grammar,the major disciplineof the monasticliberalarts.The memorable
and auditionecollegeremight have
distinctionbetween oculis deprehendere
prompteda fewto wonder whethertheHE conformedto its genre or, worse,
was a mendacious book. In the abbey school Bede musthave openly criticized
Isidore's ideas about historicalwriting,at least to defend the practices of
authorslike Luke. If in the preface of theHE he used Isidore's own words to
statean anti-Isidoranposition,the ironywould not have been loston his more
alert students.Cuthbertwould have caught it. ActuallyCuthbertwritesas if
Bede's deathbed broadside against Isidore was part of the virtuethatcaused
his teacher to die in the beauty of holiness.
At any rate, Bede found forcefullanguage to brace his prefatorystance
against any detractors.A great master supplied the rhetoric.Plainly Bede
understood that Jerome's words vera historiaelex were a literaryartifice,a
polemical contrivance used to correct a misleading teacher, and that they
mightwell be employed to stressany principleof history.Through themBede
expressed not the rhetorical premise that Helvidius had ignored but the
specificallyhistoriographicalnotionsthatanother troublesometeacherhad all
on the one side, appeal
but denied. In Bede's hands the wordsveralexhistoriae,
no choice, is permitted
the
which
under
having
historian,
to the circumstances
common report;
of
source
material,
low
from
a
grade
to treatpartsof his story
to
thefama vulgans
truth
the
factual
for
all
liability
on the other, theyassign
literary
a
standard
was
the
that
Etymologiae
who
those
thought
all
For
itself.
authority,the display of Jerome's language would have emphasized that the
genre of historyallowed Bede to do withoutlyingwhat in the encyclopediais
said to be nearlyimpossible.The restof the long topos of sources exhibits,as I
have pointed out, proper respect for the kinds of informationthat were
As a whole Bede's development of the
generallythoughtto be trustworthy.
topos is an effectivecounterweightto the Etymologiae.
In the preface Bede is cautious about hisfamavulgans,but in the main body
of the workhe proceeds as if it tellsfor the most part what reallyoccurred. It
is importantto recognize thatthe common reportis never called opiniovulgi,
which for Bede was almost a technical term, used to designate erroneous
The folk traditionsof the HE are said to be
popular beliefsabout history.76
"traditioseniorum,""traditiopriorum,""traditiomalorum,""historia,"and in
76
See, in addition to the places cited in note 50, Bede's Epistolaad Pleguinam,ed. Jones,Bedae
pp. 313-3 14.
operade temporibus,

18

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

the preface alone "fama vulgans."77 More typicallyBede implies his oral
informationwith verbs and locutions like "fertur,""perhibentur,"and "ut
aiunt." On rare occasions the singleword "opinio" meaniscommon report,but
the termopiniovulgi never appears in theHE.78 This patternis too consistent
to have been accidental. Bede's ecclesiasticalintermediaries,Albinus and the
-others,must have recommended theirlocal traditionsas true so far as could
be told; thiswas surelyhis ownjudgment on the northernfama.Thus he did
not write historyfrom opiniovulgi but from oral traditionsthat respected
people viewed with favor.
From another angle opiniovulgi and the common report of the HE were
different.One was unmistakablyfalse historicalinformation,while the other
was popular historythe factual reliabilityof which Bede could neitherfully
affirmnor fullydeny. If it would have seemed grotesque to write a long
narrativefromthe one, it was worryingenough to thinkof trustingmost of a
book to the other. The unknown factual quality offama vulgansconcerned
Bede in various ways. For example, though unwrittenhagiographical lore
less highlycharged and precious material
sometimesachieved a certainfixity,
in
the
a
deal
have
retelling.The anonymousWhitbyvitaof
varied good
would
the
illustrates
Great
somethingof the problem Bede faced. For an
Gregory
incidentin the life of King Edwin of Northumbria,not of Pope Gregory,the
author complains that differentpeople reported differentthings.79Bede
found itdifficultenough to gatherthe local traditionsthatfinallycame to him;
it would have been impossibleto collectand sortout all the variantson them.
For his separate prose life of St. Cuthbert,Bede conducted what seems to
have been a complicated program of research, consulting and consulting
again withpersonsat Lindisfarneto make sure thatno one would question the
narrative.80There was no possibilityof doing the same thingfor a work the
size of theHE. Though Bede tried to get his oral traditionsfromresponsible
churchmen,he could not be sure that other knowledgeable persons would
accept the traditionsas they had been sent to him.
Then too it must have troubled Bede to thinkhow much opiniovulgi was
hiding in thefama vulgans,for there was littlechance of detectingit. From
bitterexperience he knew how wrong unletteredfolkcould be when it came
to historicaltruth.Long before he wrote the HE, some Hexham "rustics,"as
he calls them,accused him of heresyforhavingtaughtthattherewas less time
between Adam and Christthan theywere prepared to believe.81They made
the charge at table with no less than Bishop Wilfrid,Bede's diocesan. Bede
E.g., HE Praef., pp. 4-6; 2.1, p. 132; 4.2, p. 404; 5.24, p. 566.
1:xliv-xlv,n. 3. For "opinio,"HE
On thispracticesee Plummer'sdetailed note,Operahistorica,
2.1, pp. 132-134.
79 The WhitbyLife
survivesin a singlemanuscript,St. Gall MS 567, pp.75-110. Itwas firstedited
theGreat(Westminster,1904), and then (with
by Francis A. Gasquet, A Life ofPope St. Gregory
Monkof
theGreatbyan Anonymous
translationand notes) by B. Colgrave,TheEarliestLifeofGregory
(Lawrence, Kans., 1968). The referencehere is to chapter 16 (Colgrave, pp. 98-99).
Whitby
80
Praef.,ed. Colgrave, Two Lives, pp. 142-144.
Vita SanctiCuthberti
81 On this affairsee Jones,Bedae operade temporibus,
pp. 132-135.
77

78

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

19

Jerome'stranslationof
had formedhis view fromthe studyofHebraicaveritas,
the Hebrew Old Testament. The otheropinion was a millenarianchronology
thathad grown fromthe Latin versionof the Septuagintand was apparently
currentin ecclesiasticalinstructionin Northumbria.Replying to the charge,
Bede pronounced it "opinio vulgaris" and appealed angrily to the clear
testimonyof a betterbiblical text.82The whole affairremained on his mind
for many years. It must have made him ask, as he began to gather materials
for the HE, whethercommon people could be rightabout English history
when in the presence of bishops theymightbe inflexiblywrongabout even the
sacred past.
Folk traditionswere not the ideal startfor Latin historiography,and Bede
then,is partlya caveat, warningthe reader that
knew it. His vera lexhistoriae,
hisfamavulgansmay contain factualerrors.As such it concedes somethingto
Isidore, though not much. Bede wrote the preface in the confidencethat his
authorial reputation was not at the mercy of the common report, for the
genre of historyboth authorized its use and protected the historianhimself
against the "lies," factualerrors,for whichhe could hardlybe held responsible. Hence he offeredhis vera lexhistoriaeto assure his readers of all this
especially,it seems, those who were closely familiarwith Isidore's views of
historicalwriting.
Nothingbut circumstancesmade this"true law of history"a major premise
of the HE. It was certainlynot the key to Bede's understanding of the
historian'soffice,nor did it govern the whole of theHE. The assumptionthat
"the true law of history"rules the entire narrativemay cause one to miss the
appearance of other historiographicalprinciples. Once, for example, Bede
refersto himselfas "verax historicus,"and some have concluded that these
since "the true historian"obeys "the truelaw
words reflecthis veralexhistoriae,
of history."83The term comes in his account of Bishop Aidan of Lindisfarne.84Concluding the section, Bede laments brieflythe saintlyprelate's
failure to follow the Roman date of Easter. He gives Aidan the benefitof a
doubt, allowing that "the authorityof his people" (the force of opiniovulgi?)
might have caused him to keep the Irish calendar, and takes comfortto
observe that the bishop at least celebrated Easter on Sunday. Though Bede
eventuallyremarksthathe "detests"the error,there is never any malice. For
the most part he had tried, as he says, to present Aidan ". . . quasi verax
historicussimpliciterea, quae de illo sive per illum sunt gesta, describenset
quae laude sunt digna in eius actibus laudans, atque ad utilitatemlegentium
memoriae commendans...."85
According to Jones, these words "directlyparaphrase" Bede's vera lex historiae.86Their meaning does pertain to one of his exordial ideas, but not the
See the Epistolaad Pleguinam,in ibid., pp. 307, 313-3 15.
E.g., Markus,Bede, pp. 11-12. There are several others who hold thisview.
84HE 3.17, pp. 264-266.
85 Ibid.
86 Saints'Lives, p. 85.
82
83

20

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

one he calls "a true law of history."I have in mind the conventionalstatement
about the moral value of the genre: "For if historyrelatesgood thingsof good
men, the carefullisteneris stirredup to imitatethe goQd; or ifit mentionsbad
thingsof bad men, the devout and conscientiouslisteneror reader, by fleeing
what is hurtfuland wrong, is himself nonetheless moved to follow more
earnestlythe thingswhich he knows to be good and worthyto God."87 This
makes it clear enough that one gives paradigmaticlessons from the lives of
good men and cautionary instructionfrom the conduct of evil persons. It
would thereforebe at least odd to exemplifybad thingsfromthe biographyof
an unmistakablygood man and no doubt strangerstillto do the opposite. It
would distortthe genre. Aidan was more than a good man: he was a reputed
saint.It was at bestawkwardever to criticizea saintbut especiallyfearfulto do
so in a book of Latin historiography.And Bede would have been keenlyaware
thatin theHE Aidan was the first(and, as it turnedout, the last) undoubtedly
virtuousperson about whom he had momentarilyspoken ill. But Aidan's one
flawwas too importantto overlook; it.was the error thatthe Synod of Whitby
had rejected, as Bede would relate fartheron in Book Three. Hence Bede
seems to have concluded thatthe reader's recognitionof his habitual faithfulness to genre would perhaps excuse his having mentioned thisone bad thing
about an otherwiseexemplarybishop. Afterstatingthe demurrer somewhat
he asked the reader to rememberthat he, "like a true historian,"had
stiffly,
for the rest done the expected thing- both describingand praisingAidan's
godly acts and givingaccount of them "for the benefitof reading." Thus his
life of Aidan mainly had, in his view, the preferredmoral value: it related
good thingsof a good man, to stirup the reader to imitatethe good. I might
It
add thatBede does not turnhis commenton Aidan's sin into an exemplum.
remainsjust a comment,not a portrayalof sin and its consequences. All the
same, some English manuscriptsomit it; for a few later scribes it was alien
was for Bede
matter.88The larger point is, in any case, thatthe veraxhistoricus
someone who followed the generic lines of history,and it is plain thatin the
concluding remarks about Aidan the principle at stake is not his vera lex
historiae.
The survivalof more than two hundred manuscripts,most of them full
copies, showsthattheHE was in greatdemand all over Europe fromthe ninth
as such,
centuryto the end of the Middle Ages.89But Bede's vera lexhistoriae,
had verylittleafterlife,even thoughthe ideas combined in itwere well known.
In a vita of the later ninth century,Hincmar of Reims quoted part of it,
apparentlyfroma florilegium,tojustifythe writingof historyfromcommon
report;he did not give thecrucialdisclaimerof factualerrors.90Though more
HE Praef., p. 2. My translation.
For this see Plummer,Opera historica,2:167.
89 See Laistner,Hand-List,pp. 93-112. Most of the listed MSS are continental.
90Hincmar of Riems, VitaRemigiiEpiscopiRemensis,MGH SS 3:253. The clearlyBedan words
Hincmar recognizes only as an old saying,which suggeststhat in thiscase theyhad passed into
florilegialanonymity.Two later authors quote the words from Hincmar: VitaFolquiniEpiscopi
auctoreFolquinoAbbate,MGH SS 15, 1:425, and the anonymousVitaMeingoldiComitis,
Morinensis
87
88

Bede's Vera Lex Historiae

21

than fifty
complete manuscriptsof theHE were writtenin the twelfthcentury,
perhaps no more than two historians,both English,made any clear use of the
"true law of history."Far into the HistoriaAnglorum,Henry of Huntingdon
employed it with no thought offama or factual errors but to say that the
section of his work taken from the HE was, like its source, meant to notify
posterityabout previous times.9'Williamof Malmesbury,who was devoted to
classical learning, saw that Bede's term might easily signifyany historiographical principle.In the fifthbook of the GestaregumAnglorum,
just before
mentioninghis esteemed predecessor Bede, Williamremarks:". . . ego enim,
veram legem secutus historiae, nihil unquam posui nisi quod a fidelibus
relatoribus vel scriptoribusaddidici."92 William also liked the words verax
In one place he observesthatthe "true historian"may set down local
historicus.
"opinion"; in another,thatthe "verax historicus"ought not believeeverything
he hears.93His idiosyncraticuse of these Bedan words is entirelytrue to the
HE.
None of these authors, not even the hagiographer Hincmar, read Bede's
veralexhistoriae
as thetruelaw of history.In theHE his medieval readers seem
to have found exemplaryrespect for the ideal of truth,surelybecause Bede
does not claim that his narrative,on the factual level, is any betterthan its
sources. RecentlyMusca has suggested that Bede was "the Herodotus of the
Middle Ages."94As a means of locating Bede withinthe historyof medieval
historiography,the comparison is apt - except in one importantway. In the
medieval period Bede, unlike Herodotus in the ancient world, was never
known as a liar for apparentlyhaving endorsed the truthof oral traditions
about which he could not have been personallysure.95
UNIVERSITY

OF TOLEDO

MGH SS 3:557. I owe thesereferencesto Marie Schulz,Die Lehrevonderhistorischen

Methodebeiden
VI.-XIII. Jahrhundert
Geschichtschreibern
desMittelalters,
(Berlin and Leipzig, 1909), pp. 36-38.
91 Henry of Huntingdon,HistoriaAnglorum4.14, RS 74:117.
92
William of Malmesbury,GestaregumAnglorum5.445, RS 90,1:518.
93 Williamof Malmesbury,Historianovella 1.453, RS 90,2:530; Gestaregum
Anglorum2.148, RS
90,1:165.
94 Musca, II Venerabile
Beda, pp. 269-276, a chapter entitled"Erodoto del Medioevo."
95 On the ancientcritiqueof Herodotus, see Arnaldo Momigliano,"Herodotus in the Historyof
Historiography,"in his Studiesin Historiography
(New York, 1966), pp. 127-142. For theirhelp at
various stages of thisstudy,I want to thank ChristopherHoldsworth,Paul Meyvaert,and Ruth
Morse.