vortigern – Lee Duigon

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In 1796 the word in London was, “Holy cow! A brand-new Shakespeare play!” Yes, a long-lost play by William Shakespeare, Vortigern and Rowena, was set to open at the newly-expanded Drury Lane Theatre. And everybody knew it was the real thing… because all the experts said so (http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/to-beor-not-the-greatest-shakespeare-forgery-136201/).

Opening night. By the time Act III roles around, the actors in the play have come to realize that they’re performing a hoax, and a rather clumsy one at that. They play the next two acts for laughs. The audience divides between believers and those who are mighty sore about having been had, and fistfights break out. The theater management has to scuttle all plans for any subsequent performances of this turkey.

But all the experts swore it was the real McCoy. There were some who wondered if Shakespeare might have been 11 years old when he wrote this, or drunk, or impaired in some other way–but even they swore the play was genuine.

In fact, it was a forgery cooked up by 19-year-old William Henry Ireland, whose motive was to show all those people, especially his father, who said he was a dullard. The Smithsonian article will tell you how he did it. And he got tired of trying to keep up the pretense, so he admitted what he’d done–and still there were those who refused to believe the play was a hoax. Mr. Ireland refused to believe his son had the brains to concoct such a scam.

The point is, all the cognoscenti, all the Shakespeare-wallahs who should’ve known better (with only a very few exceptions, who were shouted down), were completely taken in by this. It took a bunch of not-expert actors to tear away the curtain and reveal the humbug behind it.

If the play’s authenticity were being debated today, its defenders would surely be proclaiming, “The science is settled, so shut up!”

As our own leaders scramble to see how many illegal aliens they can jam into America in time for the next presidential election, it reminds me of an ancient king who actually succeeded in destroying his own kingdom… by much the same method.

In 5th century Britain, in the wake of the departure of the Roman government, a man named Vortigern became High King. Jealous and fearful of the lesser kings, Vortigern tried to build up his position by importing mercenaries from the European mainland–warriors from Germany and Denmark, men who would be known to us as the Anglo-Saxons. The warriors came with their extended families, young and old.

Vortigern might have stopped when his position was secure, but he didn’t. He kept bringing in pagans until whole sections of Germany were depopulated. Everyone had gone to Britain, where the living was easy and the looting was good. Had Social Security benefits been invented in the 400s, Vortigern would have handed them to new arrivals.

Once the floodgates were opened, and whole populations began pouring into Britain, the native British found themselves outnumbered and forced to fight for their lives. The Anglo-Saxon chiefs stopped pretending to obey Vortigern and set about grabbing everything they could. As for Vortigern himself, his British subjects rallied against him and burnt him alive in his own tower.

As for the native, Christian Britons, Divine Providence gave them a leader named Arthur who stopped the bleeding. Within 100 years, most of the pagan Anglo-Saxons had been converted to Christianity. Before the year 700, there were Anglo-Saxon saints. The Britons survived in Wales, in Brittainy, in Cornwall, and in the North. And God blended these different peoples into a new nation, England–whose role in world history, and in the growth of Christianity, has been considerable.

But between Vortigern and St. Bede was a mighty rough ride and many years of tribulation.

Because we will not hear God’s word, He has handed us over to leaders who seem determined to emulate Vortigern in nearly wiping out their own country. Vortigern’s fate was well-deserved–but it came too late to do the British any good.

He who has ears to hear, let him hear.