Brutus
King of Great Britain
Issue Locrinus Albanactus Kamber
Father	Silvius
Mother	Wife of Silvius

Brutus, or Brute of Troy, is a legendary descendant of the Trojan hero Aeneas, known in medieval British legend as the eponymous founder and first king of Britain. This legend first appears in the Historia Britonum, a 9th-century historical compilation attributed toNennius, but is best known from the account given by the 12th century chronicler Geoffrey of Monmouth in his Historia Regum Britanniae. However, he is not mentioned in any classical text and is not considered to be historical.

Historia Britonum

The Historia Britonum states that "The island of Britain derives its name from Brutus, a Roman consul" who conquered Spain. This is ultimately derived from Isidore of Seville's popular 7th century work Etymologiae, in which it was speculated that Britain was named after the Roman general Decimus Junius Brutus Callaicus, who pacified Further Spain in 138 BC. A more detailed story, set before the foundation of Rome, follows, in which Brutus is the grandson or great grandson of Aeneas — a legend that blends Isidore's spurious etymology with the Christian, pseudo-historical "Table of Nations" tradition that emerged in the early medieval European scholarly world and attempted to trace the peoples of the known world (as well as legendary figures, such as the Trojan house of Aeneas) back to Biblical ancestors.^[1]

Following Roman sources such as Livy and Virgil, the Historia tells how Aeneas settled in Italy after the Trojan War, and how his son Ascanius founded Alba Longa, one of the precursors of Rome. Ascanius married, and his wife became pregnant. In a variant version, the father is Silvius, who is identified as either the second son of Aeneas, previously mentioned in the Historia, or as the son of Ascanius. A magician, asked to predict the child's future, said it would be a boy and that he would be the bravest and most beloved in Italy. Enraged, Ascanius had the magician put to death. The mother died in childbirth.

The boy, named Brutus, later accidentally killed his father with an arrow and was banished from Italy. After wandering among the islands of the Tyrrhenian Sea and through Gaul, where he founded the city of Tours, Brutus eventually came to Britain, named it after himself, and filled it with his descendants. His reign is synchronised to the time the High Priest Eliwas judge in Israel, and when the Ark of the Covenant was taken by the Philistines.^[2]

A variant version of the Historia Britonum makes Brutus the son of Ascanius's son Silvius, and traces his genealogy back to Ham, son of Noah.^[3] Another chapter traces Brutus'sgenealogy differently, making him the great-grandson of the legendary Roman king Numa Pompilius, who was himself a son of Ascanius, and tracing his descent from Noah's sonJapheth.^[4] These Christianising traditions conflict with the classical Trojan genealogies, relating the Trojan royal family to Greek gods.

Yet another Brutus, son of Hisicion, son of Alanus the first European, also traced back across many generations to Japheth, is referred to in the Historia Britonum. This Brutus's brothers were Francus, Alamanus and Romanus, also ancestors of significant European nations.^[5]

Stone of Scone, also called Stone of Destiny, Scottish Gaelic Lia Fail,  stone that for centuries was associated with the crowning of Scottish kings and then, in 1296, was taken to England and later placed under the Coronation Chair. The stone, weighing 336 pounds (152 kg), is a rectangular block of pale yellow sandstone (almost certainly of Scottish origin) measuring 26 inches (66 cm) by 16 inches (41 cm) by 11 inches (28 cm). A Latin cross is its only decoration. According to one Celtic legend the stone was once the pillow upon which the patriarch Jacob rested at Bethel when he beheld the visions of angels. From the Holy Land it purportedly traveled to Egypt, Sicily, and Spain and reached Ireland about 700 bc to be set upon the hills of Tara, where the ancient kings of Ireland were crowned. Thence it was taken by the Celtic Scots who invaded and occupied Scotland. About ad 840 it was taken by Kenneth MacAlpin to the village of Scone.

At Scone, historically, the stone came to be encased in the seat of a royal coronation chair. John de Balliol was the last Scottish king crowned on it, in 1292, before Edward I of England invaded Scotland in 1296 and moved the stone (and other Scottish regalia) to London. There, at Westminster Abbey in 1307, he had a special throne, called the Coronation Chair, built so that the stone fitted under it. This was to be a symbol that kings of England would be crowned as kings of Scotland also.

Attached to the stone in ancient times was allegedly a piece of metal with a prophecy that Sir Walter Scott translated as

Unless the fates be faulty grown
And prophet’s voice be vain
Where’er is found this sacred stone
The Scottish race shall reign. 

When Queen Elizabeth I died without issue in 1603, she was succeeded by King James VI of Scotland, who became James I of England (or Great Britain). James was crowned on the Stone of Scone, and patriotic Scots said that the legend had been fulfilled, for a Scotsman then ruled where the Stone of Scone was.

On Christmas morning 1950 the stone was stolen from Westminster Abbey by Scottish nationalists who took it back to Scotland. Four months later it was recovered and restored to the abbey. In 1996 the British government returned the stone to Scotland.

According to the British historian Nennius a group of people, under the leadership of BRUTUS, invaded England some 1100 years before the Messiah and set up a dynasty of British kings. WHO was this Brutus; and WHERE did he come from? The legends and histories of the ancient world trace Brutus and his throng back to Italy and, through his ancestors, BACK TO THE TROY OF HOMER! Read the fascinating story of an Israelite refugee from Egypt who founded the famous city of TROY on the Dardanelles and started several lines of Jewish kings that are still extant in Europe today!

John D. Keyser

When the wind blows through the stone walls and battlements on top of the mound of Hissarlik, the sounds of clashing armies echo through the ancient ruins. With a little imagination the heroes of Troy can be seen walking the streets and defending the walls against the encircling Greek armies on the plain of the Troad below.

This site of ancient Troy, four miles from the Aegean Sea and four miles from the Dardanelles of western Turkey, is full of ghostly figures and mythological scenes of the ancient world to those who love the epic poems of Homer. For the readers of the classics amongst us, this is heady stuff!

After the memories of battles fought and the tragic lives of the Homeric heroes faded from human consciousness, the story of Troy and the Trojans was deemed to be fable by following generations. While retaining a core of truth, the ancient histories became confusing stories of almost nonsensical proportions, elevating the heroes of the past to super-human and godlike statue. These stories, spun by the bards and storytellers, became part of the bulk of Greek legend and lore.

The Legends of Troy

The legends claim that the oldest town in the land of Troy (the Troad) was founded by Teucer, who was a son of the Scamander (a stream of Crete, according to John Tzetzes, the 12th century Byzantine poet and grammarian) and the nymph Idaea. During the reign of Teucer, DARDANUS -- son of Zeus and the nymph Electra -- drifted from the island of Samothrace in the Aegean to the Troad, following a great deluge in the Mediterranean area. After he arrived in the Troad, Dardanus received a grant of land from Teucer and married his daughter Batea, shortly thereafter founding the city of DARDANIA at the foot of MOUNT IDA. On the death of Teucer, Dardanus succeeded him as king, and called the whole land DARDANIA.

He sired Erichthonius, who begat TROS by Astyoche, daughter of Simois. Tros named the country TROY (after himself) and the people TROES (TROJANS). By Callirrhoe, daughter of Scamander, Tros had three sons -- Ilus, Assaracus and Ganymede. From two of Tros' sons -- Ilus and Assaracus -- sprang TWO SEPARATE LINES; Ilus, Laomedon, Priam, Hector; and Assaracus, Capys, Anchises, Aeneas.