CHAPTER II.

BRITISH TRIBES.-THE ROMANS. ROMAN ROADS.-ROMAN CIVILIZATION.

BRITISH TRIBES.

HE first inhabitants of our island lived in prehistoric times, and we know very little about them beyond the fact, which ethnologists teach us, that they were a long-headed

race.

In later ages two successive immigrations of the Keltic branch of the great Aryan or Indo-European family came over from the Continent, the earlier being known as the Goidels or Gaels, and the later, who drove these before them into the regions of the West, being known as the Brythons or Britons. We know them from the writings of Greek and Latin geographers, and from the Roman historians.

In the 5th Century before Christ Herodotus has nothing to tell us about Britain or Ireland, but about B.C. 325, not long before the death of Aristotle and Alexander the Great, a certain eminent Greek mathematician of Marseilles, by name Pytheas, undertook a voyage of discovery for the development of trade, and visited. Spain, Britain, the coasts of Germany, and Norway. In our island he saw much corn growing in the fields, and sheaves gathered for threshing into large barns, whilst the people gave him to drink mead, brewed from wheat and honey. The expedition of Pytheas resulted in the growth of trade between Britain and the Continent, and a large number of coins manufactured after Greek models have in consequence been found in England.

Two centuries after Pytheas, another Greek, Posidonius, a fellow-student of Cicero, visited Britain. The report of his expedition having reached the Sicilian geographer Diodorus, the latter tells us that the inhabitants of our island lived in mean dwellings made of reeds and wood, and that they gathered in their harvest by cutting off the ears of corn, wasting the straw. After this there was an ever increasing intercourse between Britain and the more civilized countries under Roman rule, whose writers add sufficiently to our knowledge to enable us to sketch in outline. the condition of our forefathers in those twilight ages, when as yet the Star had not risen out of Jacob, nor the Lion of the Tribe of Judah come to His birth.

Let us therefore in imagination take our stand upon the hill top at Highfield, and cast our glance backwards for two thousand years. We shall look out upon a very different scene from that which to-day meets our view. At once we recognize the rounded hill five miles due West as the crow flies; but it is covered with low shrubs and trees, and has not yet earned its name of Gringley, the Green Lea. Between its foot and the base of our own hill is a wild marshy tract, through which flow the tortuous windings of the Trent, for the stream has not yet been confined within its proper banks. The reedy swamps are the home of myriads of waterfowl, otters disport themselves in sequestered pools, and here and there a colony of industrious beavers raises its powerful dam athwart the current. Highfield Hill itself and the upper ground as far as Thonock are covered with brushwood interspersed with oaks and other forest trees, except where patches of cultivated land appear, furrowed a few inches deep by the primitive wooden ploughs of the inhabitants. Moored to the banks of the river, or drawn up beyond the reach of the tide, are coracles, light wickerwork boats covered with skins, in which the natives cross the stream, or perhaps fish in its troubled waters; whilst here and there we distinguish a larger vessel, hollowed from the trunk of an oak, and furnished with oars and sails; for the people venture now and then a considerable distance from home, for purposes of plunder or of trade.

The dwellings of these early inhabitants of Gainsburgh are grouped upon the lower slopes of the hill, beyond the reach of river floods. They have horses, of smaller breed than our own, but strong enough to make their war-chariots extremely formidable to their enemies. Large herds of cattle graze in the forest, where also their swine wander almost at will. Nearer home are flocks of sheep and goats, and hunting dogs of famous breed chase the wild deer, and wage battle with the wolf; but the hare is too sacred to be used for food. The people themselves are a manly race of men, easily distinguishable from those of Southern lands by their blue eyes, their superior height, and their great strength.' Those whom Strabo, a century later, saw brought in slavery to Rome were "higher by half a foot than the tallest men there." They are by nature "a most warlike nation, eager for slaughter."2 Yet "there is a simplicity in their manners which is very different from the craft and wickedness which mankind exhibit elsewhere. They are satisfied with a frugal sustenance, and avoid the luxuries of wealth."3 Cicero spoke rhetorically when he said that "there was not a scruple of money in the island," for both gold and silver coins of native manufacture are in existence, but it is probable that most of their commercial transactions were carried on by means of barter.4

We do not really know much of the religion of these early Britons. Cæsar tells us that human sacrifices were not unknown. The oak tree and the mistletoe were sacred, and the Druids, their religious leaders, were acquainted with astronomy, and taught them the nature of things, and the power of the Gods.5 We need not, indeed, be ashamed of our early British forefathers, although their bodies are dyed with woad, and like our first parents, they wear coats of skins.

The inhabitants of this district, as of what are now the Counties of Nottingham, Leicester, Derby, Rutland, and Northampton, are the Coritani or Coritavi, a Keltic tribe. Their neighbours to the

North are the Brigantes, their Southern neighbours are the Catuvelauni and the Eceni or Iceni, all of them distinguished by their fierce opposition to the Romans. The Coritani themselves are seldom mentioned in history, and if their blood still flows in the veins of the present inhabitants it has certainly been greatly diluted by intermarriage with other races.

Yet have the Coritani left some traces which will never be obliterated. The County and its capital city embody in their names the ancient Keltic word for water. Now and then their warships are unearthed, deep buried in the soil, and the mounds. of Thonock were in all likelihood, in the first instance, the work of their hands.

THE ROMANS.

The increasing intercourse between Britain and the Continent at length attracted the notice of the rulers of the Roman Republic. Julius Cæsar, fighting in Gaul, was led to understand that the Gallic forces received assistance from their neighbours across the Channel, and made up his mind to annex Britain to the Republic, or at least to make the island subject to tribute. In B.C. 55 he embarked with two legions, and after spending a few precarious weeks in Britain returned to celebrate his triumph in Rome. The next year he penetrated beyond the Thames, but only remained about two months, after which no Roman army disturbed the seclusion of Britain for nearly a whole century. Meanwhile commercial intercourse continued, and an increasing number of British tribes adopted the use of a coinage copied from the Romans. Strabo, writing about A.D. 19, says that Britain exported gold, silver, iron, corn, hides, cattle, slaves, and huntingdogs. Tacitus adds pearls to the list, and Pliny the elder, who perished in the destruction of Pompeii, informs us that Cæsar had dedicated in the Temple of Venus a corslet made from British pearls.

In A.D. 48 the Emperor Claudius determined to extend the Roman power over Britain, which he visited himself. In 61

Boudicca or Boadicea, Queen of the Iceni, was defeated near London by Suetonius, and from this time Roman civilization began to spread gradually over all parts of the land, except the extreme North. But we have no record of the Roman conquests being pushed as far North as Gainsburgh until the coming of Agricola, who in 79 or 80 subdued the Brigantes, establishing a military settlement at Eboracum, York. The Emperor Hadrian visited Britain in 120, and built a wall between Solway Firth and the Tyne. In 211 the Emperor Severus died at Eboracum, which had long been the seat of Roman government. Constantius died there in 306, after which his son Constantine became Emperor. Maximus was proclaimed Emperor in Britain in 383, but not long afterwards withdrew the Roman army to defend Italy against the Goths; and in 410 Honorius addressed a letter to the cities of Britain, finally surrendering all control over the fortunes of the Island. From this time the native tribes were left to defend themselves as best they might against the attacks of Northern invaders, a task that was quite beyond their powers, since the withdrawal of the four well-disciplined legions usually stationed in Britain left them almost at the mercy of their foes. The Romans had been more or less closely connected with the fortunes of our Island for more than 350 years, and for quite three centuries had been the virtual masters of almost the whole of what is now England. It cannot have been but that in that period, which was twice as long as the English have ruled in India, they effected great and far-reaching changes, not only in the physical condition of the country, but in the social habits and customs of the people. It is, in truth, abundantly clear that their rule was of such a character that its traces must remain until the latest generations of mankind.

The Romans were the great civilizing influence of their time, and during their long domination they covered this country with a network of splendid roads, erected sea-banks, dug canals, confined the rivers within their proper channels, built castles and walled cities, developed agriculture and commerce, and were the protecting guardians under which Christianity became known throughout the land.