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Updated: June 15, 2025
The description of Britain is given in very nearly the same terms, by Orosius, Bede, and others, but the numbers denoting the length and breadth and other dimensions, are different in almost every MS. Copy. "Soporem" in some MSS., "saporem" in others; it is difficult from the turgidity and superabundance of the style to determine which is the best meaning.
The same energy and comprehension of mind which induced and enabled Alfred to improve his navy so much, led him to favour geographical pursuits and commere. In his Anglo-Saxon translation of Orosius, he has inserted the information he had obtained from two Scandinavians, Ohter and Wulfstan.
In Palestine, towards the latter half of the year 415, Orosius attacked the Pelagians by writing against them a treatise on Free Will, and presenting a memorial against them to the Council of Diospolis. It was at the request of St Augustine that Orosius wrote his History.
For example, he found a Latin work on history and geography by Orosius, a Spanish Christian of the fifth century; but as this book contained much material that was unsuited to Alfred's purposes, he omitted some parts, changed others, and, after interviewing travelers from the far North, added much original matter.
Compilers like Florus, Orosius, Eutropius, &c. entirely supplied his place. A word should perhaps be said about POMPEIUS TROGUS, who about Livy's time wrote a universal history in forty-four books.
These three additions to "Orosius" the Description of Europe, the two voyages of Ohthere, and the voyage of Wulfstan may be considered Alfred's own works. The Description is the king's own account of Europe in his time, and the only authentic record of the Germanic nations, written by a contemporary, so early as the ninth century.
So in translating Boethius, he altered a good deal, to make the wise heathen speak like a Christian. So in translating Orosius, where Orosius gives an account of the world, Alfred greatly enlarged the account of all the northern part of Europe, of which Alfred naturally knew much more than Orosius did.
Tarragona, the flourishing capital of a peaceful province, was sacked and almost destroyed; and so late as the days of Orosius, who wrote in the fifth century, wretched cottages, scattered amidst the ruins of magnificent cities, still recorded the rage of the barbarians.
According to tradition it belonged to the church of the Franciscans outside the walls, built in 1288 by Elena, wife of Orosius I. The church was pulled down when there was war between Venice and the Turks, and moved within the Porta Gordicchio, which was therefore called the Porta S. Francesco. Most of the convents are now used by the military authorities.
In the translation of Orosius, Alfred has inserted a sketch of the geography of Germany, and the reports of explorations made by two mariners under his auspices among the natives dwelling on the coasts of the Baltic and the North Sea further proof of the variety of his interests and the reach of his mind.
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