It is not surprising that some of the historians of Roumania, who have managed to fill volumes, should have slurred over what really constitutes half the period of her national existence in a few pages, nay even in some instances in a few lines; and that they should have substituted what one writer has called ’brilliant declamatory evolutions’ for the conclusions of careful research.  For the last method sometimes leads to the discovery of discrepancies between standard authors of fifty or a hundred years in the chronicle of events.  For us the history of the so-called dark ages in that part of Europe is full of interest, inasmuch as the Danubian plains constituted the highway over which the barbarians wandered who were the ancestors of a large proportion of the existing population of Europe; and we have sought, in the table appended to this work, to bring some kind of order out of the chaos of events narrated by historians.[109] Beyond this, it is true, we cannot do much to serve the student of history, and it is a matter of regret that the character of this work necessitates our treating the subject with such inconvenient brevity; but we must appeal to the patience and good nature of our readers whilst we seek to give as much interest as possible to a necessarily dry and tedious narrative.

For about a century after the withdrawal of the Roman legions, the Goths, a people of whose origin and exploits we have already spoken, ruled in Trajan’s Dacia, except during a brief interval (327 A.D.) when Constantine, having built a bridge across the Danube at or near Nicopolis on the southern, and Turnu-Magurele on the northern bank, overran the country and once more incorporated it with the Empire.  This occupation was, however, of short duration.  Finding that he could not maintain his supremacy north of the Danube, and that the Goths were even settling on the right bank, Constantine is said to have established Roman colonies south of the Balkans, and, according to some historians, it was from those settlers that the country has derived its present name of Roumelia.  That the Goths must have founded permanent settlements in various parts of Dacia is obvious from the traces they have loft behind them, notably in the neighbourhood of Buseu.[110] Moreover, in the middle of the century (361 A.D.) they are said to have embraced Christianity, although we hear shortly afterwards (370 A.D.) that their king Athanaric subjected the Christians to the most cruel persecutions.  At that time they were probably on more neighbourly terms with the Romans, for when a new enemy, the Huns, appeared in the east and threatened them with annihilation, many of them were allowed by the Emperor Valens to cross the Danube and settle peaceably on the right or southern bank.  Shortly afterwards, however, we find them first defeating and slaying Valens and then fighting in alliance with the Huns (378) against the Emperor Theodosius, who attacked them in Dacia.  This is the last we hear of the Goths as such, but a branch, the Gepidae, afterwards rose again and for a considerable period dominated in Dacia.