the big h, scourge of god himself.
priscus==========================
http://www29.homepage.villanova.edu/christopher.haas/embassy.htm
P.fr .9 Having crossed rivers mighty indeed—namely the Tisia, Tibisia, and Dricca—we came to the place where long ago Vidigoia, the bravest of the Goths, perished by the treachery of the Sarmatians. (This man, also called Vidicula and Indigoia, was one of the subjects of early Gothic lays, and judging by the mention of the Sarmatian-Gothic war he probably died in 331-32 or 334, when the two tribes were fighting during Constantine's reign. The term Sarmatians here indicates a Teutonic people who later included the Vandals, dwelling to the north of the Goths and usually allied to Rome.) Not far from there we reached the village where king Attila was staying, a village, I say, like a very large city, in which we found wooden walls made with smooth planks, their jointure imitating solidity to such an extent that the union of the boards could scarcely be seen by close scrutiny. You might see there dining rooms extended to a liberal circumference and porticoes laid out in all splendor. The area of the courtyard was bounded by a huge circuit wall so that its very size might show it to be the royal palace. This was the house of Attila, the king who held the whole barbarian world, and he preferred this dwelling to the cities captured by him.
from DEATH OF BUDA A Hun Legend ========================
http://www.mek.iif.hu/porta/szint/human/szepirod/magyar/arany/epics/html/epics1.htm
As from the distance one approaches a hive of bees,
he sees a few insects flitting here and there - a
thickening swarm, a darting dance, and then a buzz
and zoom.
The hive booms; in and out the door a thousand
shining bees are crawling back on back. So teem
the swarms of busy men as Attila's town looms up
ahead.
Buda's camp, I think, is nothing compared to these
crowds that come and go and these palaces of Attila
that stretch for miles into the fields, towering
into the heavens.
This is a great range where unbroken stallions run;
a vast field betwixt where warriors train; palace on
corral and palace on corral - it would be hard, indeed,
indeed, to count them all.
At the camp's outer edge stood the servants' tents
with poles of plain fir notched. Farther in, the
tents were finer, the joints fitted smoothly with
a plane.
The palaces of the chieftains are clustered here and
there - so many proud, so many royal homes. Town
within town passes into fields, with green stretches
of distance between.
Women dwell in their secluded towns and rule over
their courts. Krimhilda passes swiftly, if she desires,
over a hanging corridor to her lord Attila's tent.
All this is work of marvellous craft. The awl argues
dead trees into blossoms and new leaves, unlike before,
painted in oil and unfamiliar colors.
The leaves are blood-red, the blossoms gold; branches
twist into hissing dragons where green birds perch
silently, birdlike bells tinkling in their stead.
In the center on a high hill is Attila's tent, the
topmost point shaded by the ancient Turul, tremendous
wings spreading for a flight, and wrought of solid
gold by its maker.
The columns flow to the ceiling, coiling like tendrils
now this way now that, the wood plated with gleaming
gold, and velvet tapestries swelling between.
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