Paul the Deacon was a Lombard chronicler originating from a noble family in Friuli in northern
Italy. His father, Warnefrid, sent him to the royal
court of Ratchis of Pavia for his education, and later
he lived at the court of Duke Archis of Benevent
(763), until he joined the convent of St. Peter near
Civate on the Lake Como. In about 780, he entered
the Benedictine convent of Monte Cassino. In 782,
Paul secured his brother Arichis’s release from
prison—he had rebelled against Charlemagne—by
means of an elegy dedicated to Charlemagne, who
subsequently invited him to his court. Paul stayed in
Francia from 781 until 784 or 785 and composed a
history of the bishops of Metz for the king (Liber de
episcopis Mettensibus, or Liber de ordine et numero
episcoporum in civitate Mettensi), along with a collection of homilies, or sermons. In 785, he returned
to Monte Cassino, where he continued with the
composition of important chronicle accounts and
religious narratives.
In 787, he began with the work for which he is
most famous today, the Historia gentis Langobardorum (History of the Langobards), which provides a
chronological overview of the years 568 until 744.
He based his chronicle on both oral and written
sources, and included a number of Langobardian
legends. The large number of extant manuscripts
and excerpts (more than 100 still exist today)
demonstrates that Paul enjoyed a wide-reaching
popularity with his detailed and well-written chronicle. Shortly before 774, Duchess Adalperga of Benevent commissioned him to continue the Historia
Romana (Roman history) originally written by Eutropius (d. ca. 610), taking the reader from the emperorship of Valentinian I (364–375) to the times of
Emperor Justinian (527–565). Both here and in his
Historia Langobardorum, Paul places particular emphasis on the role that women played in history.
Paul also wrote a vita of Pope GREGORY THE GREAT
(590–604), a commentary of the Rules of St. Benedict, an account of miracle narratives concerning St.
Benedict, a collection of homilies (Homiliarium),
grammatical studies, riddles, epigrams, poetry, and
letters.
Bibliography
Goffart, Walter. The Narrators of Barbarian History
(A.D. 550–800): Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede,
and Paul the Deacon. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, 1988.
Paul the Deacon. History of the Lombards. Translated
by William Dudley Foulke. 1907. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 1974.
———. Pauli Historia Langobardorum. Edited by
Ludwig Bethmann and Georg Waitz. 1878. Hannover: Hahnsche Buchhandlung, 1987.
———. Pauli Historia Romana. Edited by Hans
Droysen. 1879. Munich: Monumenta Germaniae
Historica, 1978.