A.D. 404.] BRITONS SEND FOR AMBROSITJS. forasmuch as the Britons had come without their arms, and so could not withstand them. The Saxons lay waste the churches of Britain. In the year of grace'462, the Saxons bound king Vortigern and threatened him with death, unless he gave up his towns and places of defences, to save his life. He granted them whatever they demanded, in order to obtain his life and freedom. After exacting an oath from him, they let him go. They first took possession of London, and then successively of York, Lincoln, and Winchester, committing in the meanwhile great devastations. They fell on the natives in every quarter, like wolves on sheep forsaken by their shepherds ; the churches and all the ecclesiastical buildings they levelled with the ground ; the priests they slew at the altars ; the holy scriptures they burned with fire ; the tombs of the holy martyrs they covered with mounds of earth; the clergy who escaped the slaughter, fled with the relics of the saints to the caves and recesses of the earth, to the woods and deserts, and the crags of the mountains. A t the sight of such devastation, Vortigern, not knowing how to check the impious race, retired into Wales, and shut himself up in the town of Genorium.* Heresy of the Acephali. In the year of grace 463 sprung up the heresy of the Acephali, who resisted the council of Chalcedon. They are called Acephali, which means, without a head, because it is not known who was the author of the heresy. They deny the property of two substances in Christ, and contend that there is but one nature in his person. The Britons implore military succour. In the year of grace 464, the Britons sent messengers into Brittany to Aurelius Ambrosius and his brother Uterpendragon, who had been sent there for fear of Vortigern, beseeching them to come over from the Armorican country without delay, to drive out the Saxons and king Vortigern, and take the crown themselves. As they had now arrived at man's estate, they began to make preparations of men and * The town of Genorium is called Genoren by Higden.