Page:Historical Works of Venerable Bede vol. 2.djvu/366

 294 A.M. 4671 [720].

Theodosius reigned 1 year. Being chosen emperor, he Overthrew Anastasius, in a severe engagement near the city of Nice, and having taken the oath, he caused him to enter holy orders and to be ordained a priest. On acquiring the throne, as a good Catholic he replaced the revered painting in which the six holy councils had been depicted, and which Philippicus had removed. The river Tiber left its channel and did great damage to the city of Rome; insomuch that in the Via Lata it rose half as high again as the human stature, and taking a course from the door of St. Peter's it resumed its channel at the Milvian Bridge; thus it remained for seven days, and after the offering up of many prayers by the people, it returned to its bed on the eighth.

In those days a multitude of the English nation, high and low, men and women, gentle and simple, impelled by love to God, journeyed from Britain to Rome; and amongst them also my most beloved Abbot Ceolfrid, in the seventy-fourth year of his age, (forty-seven of which he had been a priest, and thirty-five an abbot,) went as far as the Ligones, where he died, and was buried in the church of the blessed Twin Martyrs. Amongst his other offerings, he sent to our church of St. Peter a Pandect translated partly out of Hebrew and partly out of Greek into Latin by Saint Jerome.

A.M. 4680 [729].

Leo reigned 9 years. The Saracens come with an immense army and besiege Constantinople in the third year, until at the earnest prayers of the citizens to God, a vast number of the enemy perished from famine, cold,