On Time and Narrative
Volume I of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica itemizes a list of events in Gaul that occurred during the eighth, ninth and tenth centuries. Although it lists facts, it doesn’t have any of the elements that we would think of as story. It gives us an idea of culture and conflict. It lists the events in humanly experienced time. This form of time has no high points or low points. It is endless. It does not conclude. It simply terminates. The list of times are full, even if the experiences are not. There is very little romance and no sense of nostalghia in the true annals of history.
An excerpt from 709-734 A.C.E:
709: Hard winter. Duke Gottfriend died.
710: Hard year and deficient in crops.
711:
712: Flood everywhere.
713:
714: Pippin, Mayor of the Palace, died.
715:
716:
717:
718: Charles devastated the Saxon with great destruction.
719:
720: Charles fought against the Saxons.
721: Theudo drove the Saracens out of Aquitaine.
722: Great crops.
723:
724:
725: Saracens came for the first time.
726:
727:
728:
729:
730:
731: Blessed Bede, the presbyter, died.
732: Charles fought against the Saracens at Poitiers on Sunday.
733:
734:
