B.C. 55-A.D. 1066.

CHAPTER I.

THE BRITONS AND ROMANS.

§ 1. Earliest Notices of Britain. § 2. The earliest Inhabitants of Britain were Celts of the Cymric Stock. § 3. Religion of the Britons. § 4. Knights and Bards. § 5. Manners and Customs of the Britons. § 6. British Tribes. § 7. Cæsar's two Invasions of Britain. § 8. History till the Invasion of Claudius. § 9. Caractacus. § 10. Conquest of Mona; Boadicea. § 11. Agricola. § 12. The Roman Walls between the Solway and the Tyne, and the Clyde and the Forth. § 13. Saxon Pirates; Carausius. § 14. Picts and Scots. § 15. Final Departure of the Romans. § 16. Condition of Britain under the Romans. § 17. Christianity in Britain.

§ 1. THE Southwestern coasts of Britain were known to the Phoenician merchants several centuries before the Christian era. The Phoenician colonists of Tartessus and Gades in Spain were

A

attracted to the shores of Britain by its abundant supply of tin, a metal of great importance in antiquity from the extensive use of bronze for the manufacture of weapons of war and implements of peace. It would seem that the Phoenicians originally obtained this metal from India, since the Grecian name for tin is of Indian origin, and must have been brought into Greece by the Phoenicians, together with the article itself. Accordingly, when these traders found tin in the Scilly Isles, they gave them the name of the Cassiterides, or the Tin-islands, an appellation by which they were known to Herodotust in the fifth century before the Christian era. Aristotle, however, is the first writer who mentions the British islands by name. He says, "In the ocean beyond the Pillars of Hercules are two very large islands, called Bretannic, namely, Albion and Ierne;"‡ the former being England and Scotland, the latter Ireland. The origin of the name of Britain is very uncertain, but that of Albion is perhaps derived from a Celtic word signifying white, a name probably given to the island by the Gauls, who could not fail to be struck with the chalky cliffs of the opposite coast. Himilco, a Carthaginian navigator, whose diary was extant in the fifth century of our era, and who is repeatedly quoted as an authority by Festus Avienus in his geographical poem called Ora Maritima, touched near Albion at the Tin Islands, which he calls Oestrymnides. But the oldest writer who gives any account of the inhabitants is Pytheas, a Massilian, fragments of whose journal have been preserved by Strabo and other writers. By these means some knowledge of the British islands became gradually diffused among the natives of the Mediterranean. They had excited the curiosity and inquiries both of Polybius and Scipio as early as the second century before the Christian era.||

In addition to the Phoenician merchants, the Greek colonists of Massilia (Marseilles) and Narbo (Narbonne) carried on a trade at a very early period with the southern parts of Britain, by making overland journeys to the northern coast of Gaul. The principal British exports seem at that time to have been tin, lead, skins, slaves, and hunting-dogs, of which the last were used by the Celts in war; but at a later period, when the Britons became more civilized, corn and cattle, gold, silver, and iron, and an inferior kind of pearl may be added to the list. An interesting account

The Greek name for tin is kassiteros (kaooirepog), which evidently comes from the Sanscrit kastira. † iii., 115. De Mundo, c. 3. § Many writers derive it from a Celtic word, brith or brit, "painted," because the inhabitants stained their bodies with a blue color extracted from woad. In the early Welsh poems we find the island called Prydain, which is clearly the same as Britain; but whether this is a genuine Celtic word, or borrowed from the Romans, can not be determined. || Polyb., iii., 57.

CHAP. I.

EARLIEST INHABITANTS OF CYMRY.

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'of the British tin-trade is given by Diodorus Siculus.* This writer relates that the inhabitants near the promontory of Belerium (Land's End), after forming the tin into cubical blocks, conveyed it in wagons to an island named Ictis,† since at low tides the space between that island and Britain became dry. At Ictis the tin was purchased by the merchants, who carried it across to Gaul.

§ 2. Nothing is known of the history of Britain till the invasion of the island by Julius Cæsar in B.C. 55. The fabulous tale of the colonization of the island by Brute the Trojan, the great-grandson of Æneas, and of his long list of descendants, does not require any serious refutation. The only certain means by which nations can indulge their curiosity in researches concerning their remote origin is to consider the language, manners, and customs of their ancestors, and to compare them with those of the neighboring nations. There can be no doubt that the first inhabitants of Britain were a tribe of Celts, who peopled the island from the neighboring continent. Their language was the same; their manners, their government, their superstition-varied only by those small differences which time or a communication with the bordering nations must necessarily introduce. The Celts are divided into two great branches, the Gael and the Cymry, of whom the former now inhabit Ireland and the Highlands of Scotland, and the latter the principality of Wales. It has been vehemently debated whether the ancient Britons belonged to the Gaelic or Cymric stock of the Celtic race; but we may safely acquiesce in the conclusion of the most cautious modern inquirers, that both the Britons and the Gauls of the continent were Cymry, and that the Welsh may be regarded as the descendants of the ancient inhabitants. In proof of this it may be sufficient to mention that the Celtic words which still exist in the English language are clearly to be referred to the Cymric and not to the Gaelic dialect.

The Gallic origin of the ancient Britons is expressly stated by Cæsar, who says that the maritime parts of the island were inhabited by Belgic Gauls, who had crossed over from the main land for the sake of plunder. He adds, it is true, that the inhabitants of the interior were said by tradition to have sprung from the soil; from which we can only infer that the earlier immigrations of the Celts took place long before the memory of man. Tacitus,

V., 22.

+ This island has been identified with the Isle of Wight on account of the resemblance of its name to Vectis; but its proximity to the tin country, and the circumstance of the intervening space between this island and Britain being dry at the low tides, favor its identification with St. Michael's Mount, Bell. Gall., v., 12.

who derived his information from his father-in-law Agricola, supposed that the red hair and large limbs of the Caledonians indicated a German origin; and that the dark complexion of the Silures, their curly hair, and their position opposite to Spain, furnished grounds for believing that they were descended from Iberian settlers from that country; but these were evidently mere conjectures, to which Tacitus himself seems not to have attached much importance, since he adds that upon a careful estimate of probabilities we must believe that the Gauls took possession of the neighboring coast.

§ 3. The connection of the Britons with the Celts of Gaul is shown by their common religion. Cæsar, indeed, was of opinion that Druidism had its origin in Britain, and was transplanted thence into Gaul; and it is certain that in his time Britain was the chief seat of the religion and the principal school where it was taught. But this circumstance only shows that the common faith of the Celtic tribes had been preserved in its greatest purity by the remotest and most ancient of them, who had been driven by the tide of emigration to the western parts of the island.

The religion of the Britons was one of the most considerable parts of their government, and the Druids, who were their priests, possessed great authority among them. Besides ministering at

the altar and directing all religious duties, they presided over the education of youth; they enjoyed an immunity from war and taxes; they possessed both the civil and criminal jurisdiction; they decided all controversies, among states as well as among private persons, and whoever refused to submit to their decrees was exposed to the most severe penalties. The sentence of excommunication was pronounced against him; he was forbidden access to the sacrifices or public worship; he was debarred all intercourse with his fellow-citizens; he was refused the protection of the law; and death itself became an acceptable relief from the misery and infamy to which he was exposed. Thus the bands of government, which were naturally loose among that rude and turbulent people, were happily strengthened by the terrors of their superstition.

No species of superstition was ever more terrible than that of the Druids. Besides the severe penalties which it was in the power of the priests to inflict in this world, they inculcated the eternal transmigration of souls. They practiced their rites in dark groves or other secret recesses; and, in order to throw a greater mystery over their religion, they communicated their doctrines only to the initiated, and strictly forbade the committing of them to writing, lest they should at any time be exposed to the * Agricol., c. 11.

CHAP. I.

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.

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examination of the profane vulgar. In the ordinary concerns of life, however, they employed writing, their characters being either the Greek or a sort of hieroglyphics formed from the figures of plants. Of the nature of their rites, except their veneration for the oak and mistletoe, we know but little. If a mistletoe was discovered growing upon an oak, a priest severed it with a golden knife; on which occasion a festival was held under the tree, and two milk-white bulls were offered as a sacrifice. The Druids worshiped a plurality of gods, to which Cæsar, after the Roman fashion, applies the names of the deities of his own country. The attributes of the god chiefly worshiped appear to have resembled those of Mercury. The stupendous ruins of Stonehenge, situated in Salisbury Plain, are probably the remains of a Druidical temple, but it is not mentioned by any ancient writer.* The principles which the Druids inculcated were piety toward the gods, charity toward men, and fortitude in suffering. They taught their disciples astronomy, or rather perhaps astrology, and magic, and trained them to acuteness in legal distinctions; and a term of twenty years was commonly devoted to the acquisition of the knowledge which they imparted. They chose their own high-priest, but the election was frequently decided by arms.

Human sacrifices formed one of the most terrible features of the Druidical worship. The victims were generally criminals, or prisoners of war, but, in default of these, innocent and unoffending persons were sometimes immolated; and in the larger sacrifices immense figures made of plaited osier were filled with human beings and then set on fire. The spoils of war were often devoted by the Druids to their divinities; and they punished with the severest tortures whoever dared to secrete any part of the consecrated offering. These treasures they kept in woods and forests, secured by no other guard than the terrors of their religion; and this steady conquest over human avidity may be regarded as more signal than their prompting men to the most extraordinary and most violent efforts. No idolatrous worship ever attained such an ascendant over mankind as that of the ancient Gauls and Britons; and the Romans, after their conquest, finding it impossible to reconcile those nations to the laws and institutions of their masters while it maintained its authority, were at last obliged to abolish it by penal statutes; a violence which had never in any other instance been practiced by those tolerating conquerors.

§ 4. After the Druids, the chief authority was possessed by the

In the compound word Stone-henge, the latter half, henge, probably signifies the impost, which is suspended on two uprights, and consequently the word might be used in any case in which one stone was suspended on two or more others.-Guest, in Proceedings of Philological Society, vol. vi., p. 33.