The Library
1780 works catalogued century by century, from the literature the Bible was written among to the present — each with a note on what it is, why it lasted, and where to read it.
501–600
2 works
c. 587
Latin
Venantius Fortunatus · c. 530 – c. 609
A Thuringian princess taken as war booty by the Frankish king who had killed her family, married to him, and eventually escaped to found a monastery at Poitiers. Fortunatus, her friend, describes the fasting, the iron chains, and the burns she inflicted on herself.
c. 573–594
Latin
Decem Libri Historiarum
Gregory of Tours · c. 538–594
Ten books from creation to the author's own day, dominated by the murderous politics of the Merovingian royal family, told in a Latin the author apologises for.
601–700
2 works
c. 660
Latin
Anonymous
A Frankish world chronicle continuing Gregory of Tours, in Latin so broken that historians use it to study the emergence of the Romance languages.
c. 673–684
Latin
Vita Eligii
Audoin of Rouen · c. 609 – 684
The life of a goldsmith who made the Merovingian royal shrines, became a bishop, and preached to Flemish peasants against Thursday observance, herbal charms, shouting at eclipses, and dancing at the solstice — the sermon lists what he was up against in detail.
4 of 1780 works