Britannia and the Attecotti

The shields above are those of four high status Roman infantry units as recorded in the Notitia Dignitatum.  All four are Auxilia Palatinum ,literally helpers from the palace or from the Imperial Presence.  Such units, there were many more of them, were the elite of the the Roman infantry.  The four above are all Irish units and Ireland, as we know, lay outside of the Empire.  They are listed as follows:

Atecotti
Atecotti Ioniores Gallicani 
Acecotti Honoriani Seniores
Atecotti Honoriani Ioniores

The designation Honorarii indicates a unit was either created or granted an honorific in the reign of Honorarius. He was named as co-Augustus in 393.  Honorarius was then 7 years old.  He became sole Augustus in 395.

Atecotti is not an Irish tribal name like the Coline (Holly People) or the Osraige (Deer People).  It is likely a Roman rendering of an Irish legal description (aithech-thúatha) meaning subject people.  That implies that some Irish potentate provided a levy of warriors from his tributary tribes to the Roman Army.  Roman units of this type were about 500, some say 600 strong.  Was someone in Ireland then, powerful enough to supply about two thousand soldiers to join the Roman Army?  What he might have received in return we can only guess at. 

There is an alternative, as Hagith Sivan noted: 

Procopius distinguished between the foederati of his own times men who after joining  the army  of their own accord, served in the cavalry and infantry under Roman commanders and as Roman soldiers, and foederati of an older sort, barbarian people who had entered the Empire not as slaves but on the basis of equality. 

It is possible that an Irish subject people weary of paying tribute and supplying warriors decided to take their chances within the Empire. Here, as Philip Rance did in his influential work on Irish Federates in Wales, we might recall the scéla The expulsion of the Déisi. Here is a link to the paper. 
 

 https://www.jstor.org/stable/526958?seq=1

Again, let us consider what Procopius wrote “barbarian people who had entered the Empire not as slaves but on the basis of equality”.  The journey was short, the motivation, for a subject tribe wishing to escape tributary status, clear and the the objective, with Roman permission, readily attainable.  As FJ Byrne reminds us “the name Déisi merely means vassals.”  That is to say they were aithech-thúatha.

What are we to make of this?  We can say that it was possible for non Roman peoples to enter the Empire "on the basis of equality".  Here we might think of the intent of the Ogham Stones that we looked at in part 1.

We can note that aithech-thúatha and Déisi mean the same thing - a people who pay tribute and provide military service to a more powerful entity. 

We can add that there is clear evidence for the existence of four elite Irish infantry units in the Roman Army while Ireland lay outside the Imperium. 

Finally, we recall the expulsion of the Déisi.  A pattern begins to form.  We will explore it shortly.  First let us turn to St Patrick who is widely credited with the successful conversion of the Irish.


St Patrick is normally placed in the 5th Century.  This has not been unproblematic.  At one stage scholars were reduced to suggesting three St Patrick's in an attempt to square the evidential circle. St Patrick was undoubtedly a real person. We have two of his letters both of which repay study. 

Recently J T Koch suggested we might better place St Patrick in the 4th Century.  As ever his logic is compelling.  He suggests we note the following:

We can identify only three men named Patricius in our period and geographical location.  

There was a  Patricius who evangalised the Irish.  A Patricius who held the post of Finance Officer to Maxim Wledig and a Patricius who left his name inscribed on the Ballinrees silver hoard. There is good reason to think that these three were one and the same man.

Should this be of further interest to you here is a link. https://www.academia.edu/7622048/The_Early_Chronology_for_St_Patrick_c._351_c._428_Some_New_Ideas_and_Possibilities

We will look at it again in the final installment of this series.  

For the moment let us return to Phillip Rance and his Irish Federates in Wales. In that paper he draws our attention to the fact that Roman sponsored settlement of the Irish did not result in any disruption to the local population specifically the local aristocracy remained undisturbed. This can only have been achieved by allocating the land resources of the Roman Military or of the Imperial Estate.  These resources were of course massive.  We can recall that they were a direct result of the Roman conquest of Britannia, later confiscations and desperate bequests.

For the local British their situation was now improved.  At no cost to themselves an additional military resource now defended their territory and was invested in its continuance.  

For the Irish warriors they now had new land for themselves and their families, no conflict with their new neighbours and a prestigious partnership with the Roman Army.  

Two additional consequences come to mind.  The Irish, as federate troops, were now able to access Roman Armories and also would have been under strong pressure to to become Christians.  That is because their soldier sponsor was an ardent Nicene Christian.  He is best known as Macsen Wledig and it is to him and St Patrick we turn to next.