I don't know when I will have time to insert the full text on this site, but a PDF version from Fileden is available. Some introductory notes have been added below, however. The full introduction includes a number of internet source links.
Resulting from this analysis and from second thoughts, there are some changes in Part 1 - The Political Philosophy, also available as PDF. The links in the previous post have been changed although the text here on the site has not (yet).
THE EPISTLE OF GILDAS
Also known as:
De Excidio Britanniae: The Ruin of Britain / On the Ruin of Britain / On the Fall of Britain
De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae: On the Ruin and Conquest of Britain
The Groans of the Britons
PART 2
THE HISTORY
Adjusted for difference in translations by Giles and Williams
and with commentary on their translations
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
1. The introduction to Part 1 - The Political Philosophy provides general background to Gildas' Epistle and this work.
2. This second Part includes an extract from Gildas' Epistle covering paragraphs 5 to 26 of the History section, in which Gildas describes the history of the Britons. Unlike in Part 1, it uses wording directly from the two translations. Although it started from the Giles translation, it has been compared in detail to Williams' version and, sometimes, Mommsen's Latin. The footnotes describe many of the changes, although a few have been made where Williams seems to have a more fluid English although the meaning remains the same. Religious texts have been removed and a little extraneous material, although there is very little of either in this part of the Epistle. In a very limited number of cases, there have been discrepancies in the translation of individual words between and within the two English versions that might be misleading. Replacement words have been inserted based on the Latin version that may not be in either of the original texts, but which is considered to be clearer and more coherent. The footnotes explain these changes.
3. The two versions rarely have identical text and it has been a personal decision on whether the differences are important or not. The particular focus in this analysis was to obtain a composite view of Gildas' history in preparation for considering the degree to which Gildas may have derived his description from a limited range of facts so that he could make it into a coherent story The reader with specific interests should not assume that lack of comment here means that differences are insignificant for their purposes. However, this analysis should still show the general way in which the two vary.
4. Comparison with the Latin version started towards the end of the compilation. It has not been systematic, starting first to clarify some of the more puzzling differences and then extending to just a few other places, as shown in the footnotes. Comments on the Latin should be viewed as unreliable. The aim was simply to compare words, with no hope of understanding grammar, etc. This may seem a reasonable objective, but it cannot be assumed that the flow of meaning of either the original or translation is the same as producing a list of translated words. The footnotes aim to clarify when this is considered to be a major problem.
5. The overall quality of the two translations is not known and there has been no attempt for this analysis to make any judgement. Indeed, the Latin version(s) used by or equivalent to Giles' source have not been found so this is not sensible. Williams uses Mommsen's Latin version. Although, as he says in his introduction, Williams has replaced Gildas' own words with external material in religious texts, this should not have affect this part of the Epistle. A footnote by Williams for paragraph 26 suggests that Mommsen has changed Gildas' original Latin to provide clarification in line with wider historical expectations in place. It may therefore be that Mommsen's Latin is an interpretation rather than a reproduction of the Epistle. If so, this introduces three levels of possible error for Williams, compared with Giles' two - his own translational and source material errors. No assumption should be made, however, that Giles is therefore more reliable. Nor should it be assumed that he is less reliable if the footnotes suggest that he differs from Mommsen's Latin as his original Latin text may also be different. The footnotes point out the most likely places where source material is different. (There also some endnotes, giving some general thoughts, in addition to those in Part 1 - the Political Philosophy.)
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