when Germanus of Auxerre is said to have visited the cult centre during his tour of Britain. Alban is also briefly mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (c. 900), and by Geoffrey of Monmouth in Historia Regum Britanniae (c. 1136). It is also possible that his martyrdom is referenced in the Acta Martyrum. Another early source for Saint Alban is the Martyrologium Hieronymianum, or the so-called 'Martyrology of Saint Jerome' in which the entry In Britannia Albani martyris probably occurred originally under 22 June. In fact, in the extant versions, Alban has acquired numerous companions because of confusion/conflation with other entries. The martyrology is preserved in a 9th-century copy but was probably composed in something close to its present form around 600, with the surviving recension showing some signs of being based on a recension compiled at Auxerre (significantly, the hometown of Saint Germanus) For Thornhill (see above), the date given for Alban's martyrdom is striking for its closeness to the summer solstice (on which some variants of the Hieronymianum actually place the saint's day). Being the day when the sun is at its brightest in midsummer, that might suggest that there is indeed some significance in the literal meaning of the name Albanus (or at least the root albho- on which it is based) as 'white' or 'bright'. Matthew Paris, the celebrated medieval English chronicler and most famous of St Alban's Abbey's monks, produced a beautifully-illustrated Life of St Alban in the 13th century, which is in French verse adapted from a Latin Life of St Alban by William of St Albans, c. 1178. It is now at the Trinity College Library in Dublin. Disputed topics Dating The date of Alban's execution has never been firmly established. Original sources and modern historians indicate a range of dates between 209 and 313. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle lists the year 283, but Bede places it in 305, "when the cruel Emperors first published their edicts against the Christians." In other words, it was sometime after the publication of the edicts by Eastern Roman Emperor Diocletian in 303 and before the proclamation of toleration in the Edict of Milan by co-ruling Roman Emperors Constantine I and Licinius, in 313. Bede was probably following Gildas. English historian John Morris suggests that Alban's martyrdom took place during the persecutions of Emperor Septimius Severus in 209. Morris bases his claims on the Turin version of the Passio