Jordanes and His Getica in Rodrigo Jimenez de Rada’s De Rebus Hispaniae

The Archbishop of Toledo, Rodrigo Jimenez de Rada (early 13th century), in his work De rebus Hispaniae used Jordanes’ Getica, but de Rada’s direct source had been probably a copy of Getica very different from those that form the basis of the modern reconstruction of the text (“de Rada’s Jordanes”). First, de Rada, the only one of all the sources, refers to Jordanes as ‘the secretary (cancellarius) of the Holy Palace’ which corresponds with the hypothesis of Jordanes being the bishop of Crotone who was with Pope Vigilius in Constantinople in the 540–550s, and of identifying Pope Vigilius as the recipient of Jordane’s first work, the Romana. The article argues in favor of this hypothesis and reconstructs the circumstances that led to writing the Romana and the Getica. Secondly, de Rada’s information, going back to Jordan, contains dates for the events described in the Getica (where there are no dates), which are shifted by about twenty years compared to the real ones. In addition, some names taken by de Rada from Jordanes are rendered as if they had been transliterated from Greek. Finally, the content of “de Rada’s Jordanes” was apparently different from Mommsen’s reconstructed text of the Getica. All these circumstances are interpreted as evidence of the existence of a special protograph of “de Rada’s Jordanes”, different from the one which formed the basis of Mommsen’s reconstruction. This possibility is confirmed by Jordanes’ own reference to the existence of two copies of the Getica sent to Castalius and to Vigilius, which were not necessarily identical. It is possible that the “de Rada’s Jordanes” may still be found in Spanish archives.

early medieval sources, Goths, Jordanes, Getica, Textkritik, Rodrigo Jimenez de Rada