GILDAS

died 570? also spelled Gildus British historian of the 6th century. A monk, he founded a monastery in Brittany known after him as St. Gildas de Rhuys. His De excidio et conquestu Britanniae (The Overthrow and Conquest of Britain), one of the few sources for the country's post-Roman history, contains the story of the British leader Ambrosius Aurelianus and the defeat of the Saxons at Mons Badonicus. Gildas then condemned the corrupt priests and noblemen who came to power in the years following the Saxon defeat.