AMEN CORNER, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.

1886.

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PREFACE.


The abstract of the 'Variae' of Cassiodorus which I now offer to the
notice of historical students, belongs to that class of work which
Professor Max Müller happily characterised when he entitled two of his
volumes 'Chips from a German Workshop.' In the course of my
preparatory reading, before beginning the composition of the third and
fourth volumes of my book on 'Italy and Her Invaders,' I found it
necessary to study very attentively the 'Various Letters' of
Cassiodorus, our best and often our only source of information, for
the character and the policy of the great Theodoric. The notes which
in this process were accumulated upon my hands might, I hoped, be
woven into one long chapter on the Ostrogothic government of Italy.
When the materials were collected, however, they were so manifold, so
perplexing, so full of curious and unexpected detail, that I quite
despaired of ever succeeding in the attempt to group them into one
harmonious and artistic picture. Frankly, therefore, renouncing a task
which is beyond my powers, I offer my notes for the perusal of the few
readers who may care to study the mutual reactions of the Roman and
the Teutonic mind upon one another in the Sixth Century, and I ask