Malalas, with its emphasis on earthquakes and other portents, and the moving Akathistos Hymn dedicated to the Virgin. The range and quality of literary production tailed off sharply with the invasions of the late sixth and seventh centuries. In Italy the system of secular education and literary patronage collapsed, and few works survive apart from the varied output of Gregory the Great. As a former urban prefect Gregory was capable of writing in a classical rhetorical style, but more suited to the times were his theological and exegetical works, which helped to popularize Augustinian doctrines, and his hagiographical Dialogues, in which the saints and martyrs of Italy were presented as simple men of God in a direct 'rustic' style intended to appeal to uncultivated audiences. Benedictine monasticism, which did so much to maintain and revive cultural activity in northern Europe, had curiously little impact on Italy until the eighth century. At least as important was the role of ItaloGreek monks who promoted a knowledge of Greek in Rome and southern Italy. In general cultural life seems to have been maintained in more mundane, and unfortunately obscure, circles. The persistence of some schools is suggested by the high level of functional literacy among laymen and by the numbers of notaries and other legal experts. Clearly important were the cathedral chapters committed to the traditions of their cities and sees. It was there that most surviving works were produced and a number of prominent scholars arose. By the ninth century Italy conveys an impression of a gradual recovery, with active cultural centres in northern episcopal cities such as Milan and Verona and a flourishing intellectual atmosphere in the south.

The brightest spot on the cultural map of the Christian west was Spain. Its Church had earlier benefited from an influx of monks and scholars from Africa, and following the kings' conversion to Catholicism their policy of close co-operation with the Church led to an expanded role for bishops as conciliar legislators and ideological guardians of the kingdom. The most active and prolific of these was Isidore of Seville. Foremost in his great corpus of historical, theological, and other writings was the encyclopaedia known as the Etymologies whose simple

-50-