VORTIGERN (GUORTHIGIRNUS, WYRTGEORN)  , king of the Britons at the time of the arrival of the Saxons under Hengest and Horsa . The records do not agree as to the date of the arrival of these chieftains or the motives which led them to come to Britain . It seems clear, however, that Vortigern made use of them to protect his kingdom against the Picts and Scots, and rewarded them for their services with a grant of land . Later we find the Britons at war with the new-corners, now established in Kent, and four battles are fought, in the last of which, according to the Hisloria Brittonum, the king's son Vortemir, their leading opponent, is slain . The Hisloria Brittonrun is our only authority for the marriage of Vortigern with the daughter of Hengest before the war . It also records the massacre of the British nobles after the death of Vortemir and the subsequent grant of Essex and Sussex to the invaders by Vortigern . See Historia Brittonaim, ed . Th . Mommsen in Mon . Hist . Germ. xiii . ; Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ed .

Earle and Plummer (Oxford, 1899) Beck, Ilist . Lai., ed . C . Plummer (Oxford, 1896) .