[Footnote 161: The era of the world has prevailed in the East
since the sixth general council, (A.D. 681.) In the West, the
Christian era was first invented in the sixth century: it was
propagated in the eigth by the authority and writings of
venerable Bede; but it was not till the tenth that the use became
legal and popular. See l'Art de Veriner les Dates, Dissert.
Preliminaire, p. iii. xii. Dictionnaire Diplomatique, tom. i. p.
329 - 337; the works of a laborious society of Benedictine
monks.]