conqueror,' though Grotius translates it Audwin, 'the old or auld
conqueror'), who brought them over the Danube into Pannonia, between
the Danube and the Drave, about the year 526. Procopius says, that
they came by a grant from the Emperor Justinian, who gave as wife to
Aldwin a great niece of Dietrich the Good, carried captive with
Witigis to Byzant.

Thus at last they too have reached the forecourt of the Roman Empire,
and are waiting for their turn at the Nibelungen hoard. They have
one more struggle, the most terrible of all; and then they will be
for a while the most important people of the then world.

The Gepidae are in Hungary before them, now a great people. Ever
since they helped to beat the Huns at Netad, they have been holding
Attila's old kingdom for themselves and not attempting to move
southward into the Empire; so fulfilling their name.

There is continual desultory war; Justinian, according to Procopius'
account, playing false with each, in order to make them destroy each
other. Then, once (this is Procopius' story, not Paul's) they meet
for a great fight; and both armies run away by a panic terror; and
Aldwin the Lombard and Thorisend the Gepid are left alone, face to
face.--It is the hand of God, say the two wild kings--God does not
mean these two peoples to destroy each other. So they make a truce
for two years. Then the Gepidae call in Cutuguri, a Hunnic tribe, to
help them; then, says Procopius, Aldwin, helped by Roman mercenaries,
under Amalfrid the Goth, Theodoric's great nephew, and brother-in-law
of Aldwin, has a great fight with the Gepidae. But Paul knows naught
of all this: with him it is not Aldwin, but Alboin his son, who
destroys the Gepidae. Alboin, Grotius translates as Albe-win, 'he