troys the Gepidae. Alboin, Grotius
translates as Albe-win, 'he who wins all:' but Dr. Latham, true to his
opinion that the Lombards and the Angles were closely connected,
identifies it with our AElfwine, 'the fairy conqueror.'

Aldwin, Paul says, and Thorisend fought in the Asfeld,--wherever that may
be,--and Alboin the Lombard prince slew Thorisend the Gepid prince, and
the Gepidae were defeated with a great slaughter.

Then young Alboin asked his father to let him sit at the table with him.
No, he could not do that, by Lombard custom, till he has become son-at-
arms to some neighbouring king.

Young Alboin takes forty thanes, and goes off to Thorisend's court, as
the guest of his enemy. The rites of hospitality are sacred. The king
receives him, feasts him, seats him, the slayer of his son, in his dead
son's place. And as he looks on him he sighs; and at last he can contain
no longer. The seat, he says, I like right well: but not the man who
sits in it. One of his sons takes fire, and begins to insult the
Lombards and their white gaiters. You Lombards have white legs like so
many brood mares. A Lombard flashes up. Go to the Asfeld, and you will
see how Lombard mares can kick. Your brother's bones are lying about
there like any sorry nag's. This is too much; swords are drawn; but old
Thorisend leaps up. He will punish the first man who strikes. Guests
are sacred. Let them sit down again, and drink their liquor in peace.
And after they have drunk, he gives Alboin his dead son's weapons, and
lets them go in peace, like a noble gentleman.

This grand old King dies in peace. Aldwin dies likewise, and to them
succeed their sons, Alboin and Cunimund--the latter probably the prince
who made the jest about the brood-mares--and they two will fight the
quarrel out. Cunimund, says Paul, began the war--of course that is his
story. Alboin is growing a great man; he has married a daughter of
Clotaire, king of the Franks: and now he takes to his alliance the Avars,
who have just burst into the Empire, wild people who afterwards founded a
great kingdom in the Danube lands, and they ravage Cunimund's lands. He
will fight the Lombards first, nevertheless: he can settle the Avars
after. He and his, says Paul, are slain to a man. Alboin makes a
drinking-cup of his skull, carries off his daughter Rosamund
('Rosy-mouth'), and a vast multitude of captives and immense wealth. The
Gepidae vanish from history; to this da