Not with impunity, however, for the leader shall be killed; he shall have the name of a horse and because of that fact shall be fierce.
Henry Blois’ device here is to pretend that Merlin is predicting the coming of Horsa or as ‘Geoffrey’ calls him in both HRB and VM Horsus. By feigning prediction of the Saxon arrival through prophecy he adds historical accuracy to both VM and HRB. A record of both Hengist and Horsa are attested in Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum and in Nennius’ Historia Brittonum.
Their names are also recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, all of which Henry Blois used as source material to construct the HRB. Because their names are found in the British annals as two Germanic brothers in the Anglo-Saxon era who led the Angle, Saxon and Jutish armies which invaded the territories of the Britons in the 5th century, Merlin is supposed to be seeing their arrival as part of his prophetic vision…. regardless of the anachronism. Merlin is staged in the later era of Rhydderch in VM. The point is, ‘Geoffrey’s’ audience is unaware of chronology yet the two brothers both establish authenticity for ‘Geoffrey’’s works as they are part of the Briton’s history. In the VM:
The Saxon people, in fact, arriving in their curved keels had come to serve him with their helmeted soldiery. They were led by two courageous brothers, Horsus and Hengist, who afterwards with wicked treachery harmed the people and the cities. For after this, by serving the King with industry, they won him over to themselves and seeing the people moved by a quarrel that touched them closely they were able to subjugate the King; then turning their ferocious arms upon the people they broke faith and killed the princes by a premeditated fraud while they were sitting with them after calling them together to make peace and a treaty with them, and the prince they drove over the top of the snowy mountain.
Hengist and Horsa arrived in Britain as mercenaries serving Vortigern, eventually leading to the ‘Night of the Long Knives’, when Hengist’s men massacred the Britons at a peace accord. However, Henry forgets his own plot as it was Cadwallader, renouncing worldly things for the sake of God and His Kingdom everlasting, came unto Rome. (the prince they drove over the top of the snowy mountain). ‘Over the snowy mountain’ refers to a sojourn in Rome as I explain in the main text of this investigation.
However, ‘Geoffrey’s’ notion that Cadwaladr died in Rome is fiction and derives from a confusion of his own making where he originally read that it was Caedwalla, King of Wessex who died on a pilgrimage to Rome in 689.870
Geoffrey also has at times diffuculty in squaring his own self made circle concerning Cadwallader. in the later Vulgate version, Geoffrey has a 250 year gap between Cadwalladers death and the end of the British befor the Saxon rule of Athelstan in 924. This does not square with the British annals or Bedan Chronology. It is neccesary to understand that the First Variant was presented as part of a proof to Rome and would therefore have to follow Chronology. So Henry has to square the time between the end of British rule and the start of Saxon by making King Athelstan (ten century) a contemporary of Cadwallader (seventh century) and hope no-one notices. Because Henry Blois started to compose the Roman de Brut impostering Wace utilising the First Variant as a template of course Athelstan is still a contemporary of Cadwallader but as Wace, Henry Blois gives the correct geneology for Athelstan making him the Anglo Saxon ruler but not the First as posited in the Vulgate.
However by the end of this exposé, it will become clear to the reader that what at first appears as a mistake becomes part of a plot in the Merlin prophecies to incite the Celts to rebel against Henry II where ‘Geoffrey’ in his updated Merlinian prophecies states: Cadwallader shall call unto Conan, and shall receive Albany to his fellowship. Then shall there be slaughter of the foreigners: then shall the rivers run blood: then shall gush forth the fountains of Armorica and shall be crowned with the diadem of Brutus. Cambria shall be filled with gladness and the oaks of Cornwall shall wax green. The island shall be called by the name of Brutus and the name given by foreigners shall be done away.
Henry Blois wrote the Merlin prophecy above which also refers to the crown of Brutus in the hope that he might return to England from self imposed exile at Clugny after Henry II had been defeated by a Celtic uprising, which he himself is trying to instigate and gain the crown himself. This is why he is so nervous about returning to England from self imposed exile in Clugny in 1158.
Henry Blois is predicting the present King and Norman domination (foreigners) is going to lose the crown of Britain to the Celts. He also assumes through the knowledge that he puts himself forward as the seventh King in the JC prophecies that he thinks that once Cadwallader and Conan have succeeded against Henry II, Henry would be able to persuade others in the Kindom that he should be the next ruler being the grandson of William the conqueror.
870Lloyd, history of Wales. I:230