Chapter VIII: The Results of Caesar’s Invasions of Britain (14)

In the following year, however, the fleet must have made the land somewhere between the site of Deal Castle and the latitude of Sandwich. For the Romans, as we have seen, on the morning after their disembarkation, fought a cavalry action on the banks of a river, at a spot about twelve miles from the camp which Caesar had constructed near the place of landing: the river, as we shall afterwards see,[3340] was the Stour; and if the length of the march was estimated with tolerable accuracy, the camp must have been in the neighbourhood of Sandwich.[3341] Besides, Caesar tells us that ‘he felt little anxiety for the ships, as he was leaving them at anchor on a nice open shore’ (_eo minus veritus navibus, quod in litore molli atque aperto deligatas ad ancoras relinquebat_[3342]). The meaning of the epithet, _mollis_, has been already explained;[3343] and, moreover, although no commentator has noticed the fact, it does not need much acumen to see that Caesar was here excusing himself for having left his ships at anchor, in spite of the severe lesson which the storm of the previous year had given him, by the plea that he had selected a more favourable anchorage.[3344]

* * * * *

I began this inquiry early in 1900 with a mind absolutely unbiassed, resolved to do one of two things,--either to solve the problem, or, if that could not be done, to show, once for all, that it was insoluble. The reader knows that I have not neglected any means of ascertaining the truth; and I have provided him with the means of controlling every statement which I have made. I have set down fully and fairly the arguments of those from whom I differ; and I have kept back nothing, I have called attention to everything, that might appear to tell against the conclusion to which the evidence inevitably led. I need not say anything by way of recapitulation, for no man who has read this article attentively can be lacking either in patience or in intelligence; and I am sure that the reader is by this time convinced of these things:--that it has been demonstrated that Caesar did not land at Pevensey, or anywhere in Sussex; that it has been demonstrated that he did not land at Hythe, or anywhere in Romney Marsh; and that it has been demonstrated that he did land both in 55 and in 54 B.C. in East Kent,--in the former year between Walmer Castle and Deal Castle, in the latter north of Deal Castle. That some will still for a time dispute these conclusions is likely enough; but not those whose judgements count. For them the problem is solved.

NOTE.--The following is a transcript of the report of Messrs. Doak,
Hudson, and Sprigge, sent to me from the Nautical Almanac Office,
and alluded to on page 610, _supra_:--

‘The calculations have proved somewhat more lengthy and complicated
than was at first anticipated, since it was found on examination
that no approximate process would give results of a satisfactory
degree of accuracy. In consequence the following work has been
done:--

1. Twelve complete places of the Moon were determined from Hansen’s
“Tables de la Lune”, embodying all the inequalities. Longitude,
Latitude, and Parallax were thus obtained.

2. The Sun’s Longitude, the Obliquity of the Ecliptic and the
Sidereal Time were then computed from Newcomb’s Tables for seven
successive Greenwich Mean Noons. A slight shortening was possible
in the case of the Longitude, but the resulting error cannot, in
the opinion of Professor Newcomb, exceed ±30 seconds of arc, and is
probably about ±12 seconds.

3. The Moon’s position was then converted from Longitude and
Latitude to Right Ascension and Declination.

4. The Greenwich Mean Time of Moon’s Transit was computed for
twelve transits.

5. The times of High Water at Dover were obtained by applying the
proper quantities from the Admiralty Tidal Curve for Dover to the
times of Moon’s Transit.

6. From the Longitudes of Moon and Sun the time of Full Moon was
determined.

7. The whole of the calculations were then examined and duplicated
where desirable.

With the one exception of the Sun’s Longitude the calculations
have been rigorous, and, so far as the computing is concerned,
are of the same degree of accuracy as those published annually in
the Nautical Almanac. A very slight divergence from the truth is,
however, possible owing to the fact that the tables of the Moon and
Sun are used for an epoch nineteen-and-a-half centuries ago; but it
is very unlikely that this is large enough to affect the times of
high water or of full moon.

4th October, 1902.’

THE CREDIBILITY OF CAESAR’S NARRATIVE OF HIS INVASIONS OF BRITAIN

I have already published in _Caesar’s Conquest of Gaul_ an essay upon the credibility of Caesar’s _Commentaries_; but, as it only deals incidentally with the invasions of Britain, I intend in this place to examine certain charges which have been made against that section of Caesar’s narrative. It has been objected, perhaps justly, to the essay by competent critics in this country (though not on the Continent[3345]) that it devotes an undue amount of space to the refutation of inferior writers; but at all events those who have read it will believe that the charges which I leave unnoticed in the present article may safely be disregarded.

I agree with Dr. F. Vogel that, apart from internal evidence, virtually the only authority by which we can test the _Commentaries_ is the correspondence of Cicero; and the opinion which I have already expressed of Dion Cassius[3346] is supported by the German scholar.[3347]

1. Dr. Vogel points to a passage in one of Cicero’s letters to Atticus,[3348] which, he says, has not yet received due attention or been correctly explained:--_Britannici belli exitus exspectatur; constat enim aditus insulae esse #muratos#[3349] mirificis molibus; etiam illud iam cognitum est, neque argenti scripulum esse ullum in illa insula neque ullam spem praedae nisi ex mancipiis_, &c. The following translation will be generally accepted as accurate:--‘The result of the British war is a source of anxiety. For it is notorious that the approaches to the island are ramparted by astonishing masses of cliff; and, besides, it is now known that there isn’t a pennyworth of silver in the island, nor any hope of loot except from slaves.’ But Dr. Vogel insists that the words _Britannici belli exitus exspectatur_ ‘can only mean “the end of the British war is expected”, that is to say, it is expected that the war, being too hazardous and too unremunerative, will be entirely abandoned’.[3350] The letter in question was written, as Dr. Vogel remarks, before the 3rd of July, A.U.C. 700, that is to say, before the 8th of June of the Julian calendar.[3351] He goes on to say that for some time afterwards it must have continued an open question whether the expedition was not to be given up; for in a letter written after the 15th of July,[3352] Cicero says to his brother, ‘I wish that you could come at the time you arranged’ (_cuperem te ad id tempus venire quod dixeras_). But, says Dr. Vogel, Caesar says not a word to show that the proposed expedition was almost abandoned. Not a word directly: but Dr. Vogel believes that he can detect a significant hint in the _Commentaries_. Caesar relates that, before he sailed for Britain, he was obliged to march into the country of the Treveri, who were said to be preparing for rebellion. Soon after the legions entered the country, Indutiomarus, the leader of the malcontents, finding that resistance would, for the time being, be hopeless, sent envoys to Caesar to assure him of his loyalty and to make excuses for not having come in person to pay his respects. On which Caesar remarks, ‘Caesar was aware of his motive for saying this, and of the circumstances that deterred him from prosecuting the design which he had formed: still, in order to avoid having to waste the summer in the country of the Treveri after having made all his preparations for a campaign in Britain, he told Indutiomarus to present himself with two hundred hostages’ (_Caesar, etsi intellegebat qua de causa ea dicerentur quaeque eum res ab instituto consilio deterreret, tamen, ne aestatem in Treveris consumere cogeretur omnibus ad Britannicum bellum rebus comparatis, Indutiomarum ad se cum ducentis obsidibus venire iussit_[3353]). Now, says Dr. Vogel, although Caesar is silent as to his real motive, we may divine from the words ‘in order to avoid having to waste the summer in the country of the Treveri after having made all his preparations for a campaign in Britain’ that he hesitated for some time to carry out his resolve of making a second British expedition.[3354]

This charge rests upon a mistranslation.[3355] The words _Britannici belli exitus exspectatur_ will certainly bear the interpretation which I have put upon them: why, then, suggest another interpretation, which, even if it could be got out of the Latin, would necessitate the assumption that Caesar did not know his own mind, and that, after he had kept his army busy for six months building six hundred ships, he told his staff that, all things considered, it would be better not to make use of them, and presently changed his mind again, and did make use of them? Again, in his quotation from Cicero’s letter to Quintus, Dr. Vogel leaves out the important part. The passage runs as follows:--_Qua re suavitatis equidem nostrae fruendae causa cuperem te ad id tempus venire quod dixeras, sed illud malo tamen, quod putas magis #e re tua; magis# ... illa etiam magni aestimo_, ἀμφιλαφίαν _illam tuam et explicationem debitorum tuorum_. Read Professor Tyrrell’s translation:--‘Wherefore I should indeed wish that you could come at the time you arranged, for the sake of our pleasure in each other’s society; but yet I desire more that you should do what you think your interests demand [and stay in the camp of Caesar]; still more do I value other considerations, your being in easy circumstances, and free from embarrassments.’ Professor Tyrrell goes on to point out that ‘the words printed in italics [#e re tua; magis#], or some such words, must, as Wesenburg suggested, have fallen out’,[3356] &c. As for Caesar’s words, _ne aestatem in Treveris consumere cogeretur omnibus ad Britannicum bellum rebus comparatis_, I confess that my powers of divination are not equal to those of Dr. Vogel. I am unable to infer from these words that Caesar hesitated for a moment to carry out his matured resolve.

Dr. Vogel then calls our attention to the well-known letter in which Cicero complained that he had had no news either from Quintus or from Caesar for more than fifty days, by which he meant that the last letters which he had received were _dated_ more than fifty days before the time at which he was himself writing.[3357] Caesar’s last letter had been written on the 1st of September, and Quintus’s apparently a few days earlier.[3358] On the 25th of September they both wrote again.[3359] Dr. Vogel admits that from the 1st to the 25th Caesar and Quintus were engaged in operations against Cassivellaunus. But, he says, this does not satisfactorily explain the long break in the arrival of letters. In order to understand it, one must take into account a circumstance which Caesar himself relates,[3360] but the importance of which he minimizes, namely, that while he was campaigning on the north of the Thames, the four kings of Kent made an attack on his naval camp. It is true, says Dr. Vogel, that the attack was repulsed; but what did the Roman success amount to? All that Caesar can say for his troops is that they returned from their sortie unhurt. How long, owing to this outbreak in Kent, the communication between his army and his fleet was interrupted he tries to conceal by the meaningless expression, ‘while the operations above mentioned were going on in this district’ (_Dum haec in his locis geruntur_[3361]). As he goes on to say that Cassivellaunus, owing to the failure of the attack on the naval camp, sent envoys, one may read between the lines of his narrative that it was the action of the four kings which induced him to accept the embassy, even if he did not actually invite it.[3362]

To ‘read between the lines’ is always easy: the only difficulty is to avoid reading what is not there. The reason for ‘the complete break in the arrival of letters’ to which Dr. Vogel refers is intelligible to any reader who is not determined to convict Caesar of _suppressio veri_: the reason is either that, as I have elsewhere shown, Caesar was engaged, first in marching back from the coast into the interior, after a temporary visit to his naval camp, then in negotiations with Cassivellaunus, and, finally, in leading his army back to the sea; or, if he remained in his naval camp from the 1st to the 25th of September,[3363] that he saw no reason for writing to Cicero, or did not think it worth while to send a ship to Gaul for the sole purpose of conveying a letter. What Dr. Vogel calls ‘the meaningless expression’, _Dum haec in his locis geruntur_, is one of a class of expressions, all containing the words _dum haec geruntur_, which Caesar uses thirteen times:[3364] like our ‘meanwhile’, it is doubtless wanting in chronological precision, but it is not meaningless. Dr. Vogel asserts that ‘the complete break in the arrival of letters’ was due to ‘the outbreak in Kent’ on the part of the four kings. Yet he admits that the attack which the four kings made on the naval camp was repulsed; and Caesar adds that the garrison killed many of the enemy, and captured their leader, Lugotorix. In other words, their success was complete. All that they had to do was to beat off an attack, and this they effectually did. Even assuming that ‘the complete break in the arrival of letters’ was due to the action of the four kings, what then? It was not Caesar’s business to chronicle postal irregularities, but simply to describe his campaign.

To the very end of the narrative Dr. Vogel continues to read between the lines. ‘Thoroughly characteristic,’ he tells us, ‘is the way in which Caesar describes the results of the expedition. It is true that his account[3365] substantially tallies with what Cicero writes to Atticus,--“On the 24th of October I received letters from my brother Quintus and from Caesar, dated from the nearest coasts of Britain on the 25th of September. They had settled affairs in Britain, received hostages, and imposed tribute, though they had got no booty.” (_A Quinto fratre et a Caesare accepti a. d. IX Kal. Nov. litteras, datas a littoribus Britanniae proximis a. d. VI Kal. Octobr. Confecta Britannia, obsidibus acceptis, nulla praeda, imperata tamen pecunia_,[3366] &c.). But what about Cassivellaunus? How did Caesar balance accounts with him?’ Dr. Vogel reminds us that Caesar’s words have led Mommsen to believe that Cassivellaunus promised to pay tribute and to give hostages. But, says Dr. Vogel, Caesar nowhere says this: he only leads the reader to imagine it. What he says is this:--‘On receiving news of the action [namely, the repulse of the four kings], Cassivellaunus, who was greatly alarmed by the defection of the tribes, following the numerous disasters which he had sustained and the ravaging of his country, availed himself of the mediation of the Atrebatian, Commius, and sent envoys to Caesar, to propose surrender. Caesar had resolved to winter on the Continent because disturbances had broken out suddenly in Gaul: not much of the summer remained; and the enemy, as he knew, could easily spin out the time. Accordingly he ordered hostages to be given, and fixed the tribute which Britain was to pay annually to the Roman People, at the same time expressly forbidding Cassivellaunus to molest Mandubracius or the Trinovantes.’ (_Cassivellaunus, hoc proelio nuntiato, tot detrimentis acceptis, vastatis finibus, maxime etiam permotus defectione civitatum, legatos per Atrebatem Commium de deditione ad Caesarem mittit. Caesar, cum constituisset hiemare in continenti propter repentinos Galliae motus neque multum aestatis superesset atque id facile extrahi posse intellegeret, obsides imperat et quid in annos singulos vectigalis populo Romano Britannia penderet constituit; interdicit atque imperat Cassivellauno ne Mandubracio neu Trinovantibus noceat._[3367]) Now, observes Dr. Vogel, in the first sentence _Cassivellaunus_ is grammatically the subject, and in the last the object; but the reader involuntarily supposes him to be the object in the intermediate sentence as well. In other words, the reader takes for granted that Cassivellaunus was ordered to give hostages, though Caesar does not say so. Moreover, the first sentence, taken by itself, leads one to suspect Caesar’s good faith. For how came Caesar’s understrapper, Commius, to be with Cassivellaunus? Is it not clear that Caesar had sent Commius to Cassivellaunus as his envoy? In other words, that, whereas Caesar represents Cassivellaunus as having been driven by a series of reverses to offer submission, Caesar had in reality himself made overtures to Cassivellaunus?[3368]

If I were Caesar’s advocate I should merely reply that as Cicero states, on the testimony of his brother, hostages were given. But, as Caesar was undoubtedly not incapable of misrepresentation, Dr. Vogel’s suspicion is possibly not groundless. Caesar may have sent Commius to Cassivellaunus with an offer of terms; and if so, his narrative is so far misleading. On the other hand, Cassivellaunus may first have signified his willingness to submit; and Caesar may then have employed Commius as his agent.

Dr. Vogel’s general conclusion is that, although Caesar’s narrative is not expressly contradicted by Cicero’s letters, yet it was, from first to last, written for effect. Always literally true, it is often substantially false. His most effective weapon is the apparent clearness and candour of his style, which puts the reader off his guard, and prevents him from noticing how very ambiguous many of the statements are. He conceals essential facts and exaggerates the importance of trivial successes; and he prevents the unwary reader from noticing the slowness of his progress in Britain by inserting in the twelfth and the two following chapters of his Fifth Book a general description of the country and its inhabitants, from which point of view this otherwise very inartistic interpolation must be regarded as a masterpiece of ingenuity.

My general conclusion is that the charges which Dr. Vogel has brought against Caesar’s narrative for the most part break down, but that in the one instance which I have noted he may have detected a flaw.

2. Thomas Lewin, who was a writer of considerable ability, remarked, in regard to Caesar’s narrative of the events that immediately preceded his departure from Britain in 55 B.C., that ‘it is easy to see, notwithstanding the veil attempted to be thrown over the transaction, that he wanted only a plausible pretext for transporting himself and his army back to Gaul’.[3369]

Caesar’s account runs as follows:--‘On the same day the enemy sent envoys, who came to Caesar to sue for peace. Caesar ordered them to furnish twice as many hostages as before and take them across to the Continent; for the equinox was near, and, as his ships were unsound, he did not think it wise to risk a voyage in stormy weather. Taking advantage of favourable weather, he set sail,’ &c. (_Eodem die legati ab hostibus missi ad Caesarem de pace venerunt. His Caesar numerum obsidum quem ante imperaverat duplicavit eosque in continentem adduci iussit, quod propinqua die aequinoctii infirmis navibus hiemi navigationem subiciendam non existimabat. Ipse idoneam tempestatem nactus ... naves solvit_,[3370] &c.). Where is ‘the veil attempted to be thrown over the transaction’? Dion’s account,[3371] so far as it goes, confirms that of Caesar. ‘From Dion,’ remarks Lewin,[3372] ‘we learn that negotiations were opened by the intervention of some Morini who were friends of the Britons.’ Evidently he had not read Dion with due attention: the negotiations of which Dion speaks[3373] were opened immediately after Caesar had, in spite of British resistance, effected his landing; and Lewin forgets to add that the Britons induced the Morini to intervene. The truth of Caesar’s narrative is confirmed by the humorous frankness with which he avows that the Britons did not all obey his orders. After describing his return to Gaul, he says, ‘Two British tribes and no more sent hostages: the rest neglected to do so’ (_Eo duae omnino civitates ex Britannia obsides miserunt, reliquae neglexerunt_[3374]).

But I am not concerned to maintain that Caesar’s object was to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.[3375] The most serious omission in his account of his British campaigns has passed almost unnoticed. In the section of this book which deals with the chronology of his operations I have demonstrated that either he passed over in silence a hurried temporary visit to his naval camp which he made just before the 1st of September (the 5th of August of the Julian calendar), 54 B.C., or, if he remained in the camp from that day until his final departure from Britain, his account of his negotiations with Cassivellaunus and of the return march of his army to the coast is misleading.[3376] Moreover, as I have pointed out in the seventh chapter,[3377] there is reason to suspect that he and his officers may have known more than he would admit about the connexion between the tides and the moon’s age. But he told the truth, so far as he could ascertain it, when he had no solid motive for falsification; and when he wrote the _Commentaries on the Gallic War_, he could generally afford to be true.

THE DISEMBARKATION OF THE ROMANS IN 55 B. C.

‘The men ... weighed down with their heavy cumbrous armour, had to leap down from the ships and keep their foothold in the waves,’ &c. (_militibus autem ... magno et gravi onere armorum oppressis simul et de navibus desiliendum et in fluctibus consistendum_, &c.[3378]) This passage has occasioned needless perplexity to commentators who forgot that the ships’ bows may have projected considerably, and also that when they were run aground they would necessarily have been buried for a considerable depth.[3379] Thus it would have been possible to jump into four feet six inches or five feet of water from the bow of a ship whose draught was a good deal more.

THE SITE OF CAESAR’S CAMP IN 55, AND OF HIS NAVAL CAMP IN 54 B. C.

I have proved in an earlier article that Caesar landed in 55 B.C. between Walmer Castle and Deal Castle, and in the following year between Deal Castle and Sandwich.[3380] Camden,[3381] who assumed that Caesar landed at the same place on both his expeditions, remarked that ‘for a considerable length under this shore [in the neighbourhood of Deal] are a number of heaps like banks which some suppose to have been blown up by the wind; but’, he added, ‘I rather take them for the fortifications or defences for ships which Caesar was ten days and nights throwing up.’ If Camden was referring to the sand-dunes between Sandown and Sandwich, it is of course unnecessary to discuss his conjecture. Hasted[3382] thought that the camp of 55 B.C. might be represented by ‘remains of entrenchments still visible’, (1) ‘close to the shore between _Deal_ and _Walmer Castle_’, or (2) ‘within the country round _Walmer Church_’, or (3) ‘upon a rise ... between _Deal_ and _Upper Deal_’. But these are mere guesses; and Professor Flinders Petrie, in his ‘Notes on Kentish Earthworks’,[3383] says nothing which can support either Hasted or Camden, except that ‘there is said to be a fosse around Walmer Church’. I can only add that nobody will learn anything by going to look for it. Dowker,[3384] who deluded himself into the belief that Caesar had landed near Sandwich in 55 as well as in 54 B.C., held that he had encamped in the first year between Sandwich and Worth, in the second on Richborough Hill. But Dowker himself maintained that Richborough Hill was isolated at spring tides; and would Caesar have omitted to mention that he had sailed into the Rutupian estuary? I am inclined to believe that he encamped in 54 B.C. on the gently rising ground near Worth.

Last year (1902) I spent two days in examining the coast between Kingsdown and Sandown.[3385] The conclusion to which I came was that in 55 B.C. Caesar must have encamped either on the plateau between Walmer Castle and Kingsdown, or, much more probably, on the rising ground north-west of the plateau which is now covered by part of the town of Walmer. On returning to London, I opened the second volume of Napoleon’s _Histoire de Jules César_, and found on pages 160 and 161 that Colonel Stoffel had adopted the latter alternative.

THE WAR-CHARIOTS OF THE BRITONS

‘Chariots,’ says Caesar,[3386] ‘are used in action in the following way. First of all the charioteers drive all over the field, the warriors hurling missiles; and generally they throw the enemy’s ranks into confusion by the mere terror inspired by their horses and the clatter of the wheels. As soon as they have penetrated between the troops of cavalry the warriors jump off the chariots and fight on foot. The drivers meanwhile gradually withdraw from the action, and range the cars in such a position that if the warriors are hard pressed by the enemy’s numbers, they may easily get back to them. Thus they exhibit in action the mobility of cavalry combined with the steadiness of infantry; and they become so expert from constant habit and practice that they will drive their horses at full gallop, keeping them well in hand, down a steep incline, check and turn them in an instant, run along the pole, stand on the yoke, and step backwards again to the car with the greatest nimbleness’ (_Genus hoc est ex essedis pugnae. Primo per omnes partes perequitant et tela coiciunt atque ipso terrore equorum et strepitu rotarum ordines plerumque perturbant, et cum se inter equitum turmas insinuaverunt, ex essedis desiliunt et pedibus proeliantur. Aurigae interim paulatim ex proelio excedunt atque ita currus conlocant ut, si illi a multitudine hostium premantur, expeditum ad suos receptum habeant. Ita mobilitatem equitum, stabilitatem peditum in proeliis praestant, ac tantum usu cotidiano et exercitatione efficiunt uti in declivi ac praecipiti loco incitatos equos sustinere et brevi moderari ac flectere et per temonem percurrere et in iugo insistere et se inde in currus citissime recipere consuerint_).

M. G. Lafaye[3387] gathers from this description that the object of the warrior in running along the pole was to jump down in order to throw his javelin and to avoid being impeded in his movements by the proximity of the driver. M. Lafaye assures us that certain coins represent warriors moving on to the poles of their chariots in order to hurl their javelins: but they do not represent them as about to jump down;[3388] and Caesar says that the warrior, after he had run along the pole, stepped back again on to the car.

Caesar[3389] tells us that, after he had crossed the Thames in 54 B.C., Cassivellaunus dismissed the whole of his forces except 4,000 _essedarii_. Most commentators have inferred, I think rightly, from this statement that Cassivellaunus had 4,000 chariots; but it seems possible that by 4,000 _essedarii_ Caesar may have meant 2,000 warriors and 2,000 drivers.[3390] Napoleon the Third,[3391] on the other hand, assumes that there were ‘six _essedarii_ par char’. It is unnecessary to make any assumptions; for, according to Diodorus Siculus,[3392] who derived his information from Posidonius, every Gallic chariot carried a driver and one warrior. Furthermore, a coin of the Hostilian family, which was struck between 49 and 46 B.C.,[3393] depicts a chariot drawn by two horses, and driven by a charioteer, who is accompanied by one warrior, armed with an oblong buckler.

Professor E. B. Tylor,[3394] referring to Pomponius Mela,[3395] Lucan,[3396] and Silius Italicus,[3397] argues that the Britons used chariots armed with scythes: Tacitus,[3398] who derived his information from Agricola, says that the British army which encountered the latter in the Grampians included _covinnarii_, who, according to Pomponius Mela, were warriors who fought in scythed chariots;[3399] and Jornandes[3400] says that the chariots of the Britons were armed with scythes: but if the Britons whom Caesar encountered had used such chariots, he would certainly have mentioned the fact;[3401] and no scythes are to be seen on the Roman coins which depict war-chariots. Moreover, of the numerous interments of warriors with chariots that have been discovered in the department of the Marne not one showed any traces of scythes;[3402] nor have any such traces ever been found in Great Britain.[3403]

I have remarked in my narrative of Caesar’s second invasion[3404] that very few chariot-burials have been found in this country. It is noteworthy that of the whole number--not more than a dozen--all but two were in Yorkshire, and not one in Scotland; and also that whereas in many of the Gallic interments the chariot was placed in the grave entire, only the wheels and other detached parts were buried in Britain. The most famous of these discoveries was made nearly a century ago in a barrow on Arras Farm, close to the road between Beverley and York. Here in a large round grave in the chalk was found the skeleton of a man, inclining from which, one on each side, were two wheels, each two feet eleven inches in diameter.[3405] ‘Under and adjoining to each wheel,’ writes Thurnam,[3406] ‘were the remains of the skeletons of two small horses, neither of them exceeding thirteen hands.’[3407]

In the paragraph in which Caesar describes the tactics of the charioteers he says that ‘as soon as they have penetrated between the troops of cavalry, the warriors jump off the chariots and fight on foot’ (_cum se inter equitum turmas insinuaverunt, ex essedis desiliunt et pedibus proeliantur_). The editors generally assume that _equitum turmas_ means ‘the _hostile_ troops of cavalry’; but von Göler,[3408] with whom Napoleon III[3409] agrees, rejects this view. He argues that in Caesar’s first campaign in Britain, in his account of which the passage in question occurs, the Britons were not opposed by any cavalry, for Caesar had none with him; and that the paragraph is not to be regarded simply as a general description of the tactics of the charioteers, but also as an explanation of the tactics which they had pursued in the combat described in the preceding paragraph. Moreover, he insists that if the warriors had jumped off their chariots when they had penetrated between troops of hostile cavalry, and had then allowed the drivers to turn round and move back, it would have been impossible for them to get on to the chariots again in case of need: hostile cavalry which allowed them to do this would have been worthless. ‘According to my interpretation,’ von Göler concludes, ‘we are to understand by _et cum se inter equitum turmas insinuaverunt_ that the warriors had penetrated within the intervals of _their own_ cavalry ... the moment of jumping down, always hazardous, was protected by their own cavalry, just as nowadays cavalry protect the limbering up and unlimbering of the horse-artillery associated with them.’ See also pp. 136-7, and Taf. vii, fig 7, of von Göler’s book, and pp. 688-91, _infra_.

THE OPERATIONS OF THE BRITONS DURING THE LAST FEW DAYS OF CAESAR’S FIRST EXPEDITION

After describing how he rescued the 7th legion, which had been sent out on a foraging expedition and surprised by a British force, Caesar tells us that he led this legion and the force with which he had marched to its assistance back to camp. ‘Meanwhile,’ he continues, ‘our people were all busy, and the Britons who were still in their districts moved off’ (_dum haec geruntur, nostris omnibus occupatis, qui erant in agris reliqui discesserunt_[3410]). The words ‘the Britons who were still in their districts’ (_qui erant in agris reliqui_) evidently refer back to two passages in the thirtieth and thirty-second chapters of the Fourth Book of the _Commentaries_. In the former we read that after the storm which wrecked several of Caesar’s ships the British chiefs who had disbanded their levies and come into the Roman camp ‘renewed their oaths of mutual fidelity, and began to move away one by one from the camp and _to fetch their tribesmen secretly from the districts_’ (_itaque rursus coniuratione facta, paulatim ex castris discedere et suos clam ex agris deducere coeperunt_). In the thirty-second chapter Caesar says that, just before the 7th legion was attacked, ‘some of the natives _still remained in the districts_’ (_pars hominum in agris remaneret_). Evidently, then, the meaning of the passage which I quoted at the beginning of this note is that during and after the attack on the 7th legion, and while the Roman soldiers were employed in various duties, those Britons who had not yet left their respective districts in order to rally round their leaders did so. However, the meaning which is obvious to the ordinary mind does not satisfy von Göler,[3411] who insists that the _MS._ reading, _nostris omnibus occupatis, qui erant in agris reliqui discesserunt_, yields no satisfactory sense, and offers in place of it one of his conjectural emendations:--(nostris omnibus occupatis,) _#quae erant in agris relicta#_ (discesserunt). After a few moments of bewilderment the reader suddenly apprehends von Göler’s meaning. He fancied that _occupatis_ meant ‘having been taken possession of’, and was ignorant that _nostris omnibus_ in Caesarian Latin could not mean ‘all our belongings’; so he persuaded himself that Caesar intended to convey that the Britons, ‘having appropriated all our property, which had been left in the fields, made off’! ‘The Romans,’ he explains, ‘had not only not been able to convey into camp the corn which they had cut, but, on account of the surprise, they must even have abandoned their tools for cutting and gathering the corn.’

Comment is needless.

WHERE DID CAESAR ENCOUNTER THE BRITONS ON THE MORNING AFTER HIS SECOND LANDING IN BRITAIN?

‘Caesar disembarked the army, and chose a suitable spot for a camp. Having ascertained from prisoners where the enemy’s forces were posted, he marched against them about the third watch.... After a night march of about twelve miles he descried the enemy’s force. Advancing with their cavalry and chariots from higher ground towards a river,[3412] they attempted to check our men, and forced on an action. Beaten off by the cavalry, they fell back into the woods and occupied a well-fortified post of great natural strength, which they had apparently prepared for defence some time before with a view to war with their neighbours; for all the entrances were blocked by felled trees laid close together’ (_Caesar exposito exercitu et loco castris idoneo capto, ubi ex captivis cognovit quo in loco hostium copiae consedissent ... de tertia vigilia ad hostes contendit ... ipse noctu progressus milia passuum circiter XII hostium copias conspicatus est. Illi equitatu atque essedis ad flumen progressi ex loco superiore nostros prohibere et proelium committere coeperunt. Repulsi ab equitatu se in silvas abdiderunt locum nacti egregie et natura et opere munitum, quem domestici belli, ut videbatur, causa iam ante praeparaverant: nam crebris arboribus succisis omnes introitus erant praeclusi_[3413]).

Such is the description which Caesar gives of his first encounter with the Britons in 54 B.C. The question of the site is closely connected with the question of the place where he landed. I have proved that this place was between Walmer and Sandwich.[3414] It is clear, therefore, that Caesar could not have encountered the Britons either at Robertsbridge on the Rother, where Airy believed that he had discovered the battle-field,[3415] or at Wye on the Great Stour, the site adopted by Lewin.[3416] It is certain, however, that the battle was fought either on the Great Stour or on the Little Stour.

1. Napoleon the Third[3417] asserts that the river mentioned by Caesar was ‘unquestionably the Little Stour’; and he maintains that the left bank in the neighbourhood of Barham and Kingston corresponds with the description of the combat. The rising ground on this bank is not, he remarks, too uneven to have prevented war-chariots and cavalry from acting, and, as the text of the _Commentaries_ requires, the Britons would have occupied a commanding position (_locus superior_) on the gentle slopes which terminate at the water’s edge. We may safely conclude, he adds, from Caesar’s narrative that the combat was unimportant, and that his cavalry crossed the river without difficulty.

Lewin[3418] dismisses this view with the remark that the Little Stour is ‘too insignificant to have been designated by Caesar as a river’; but the Emperor, who had anticipated this objection, replied that Caesar used the same word (_flumen_) to denote the Oze and the Ozerain,--the two rivulets which encompass Mont Auxois in the Côte-d’Or, where Vercingetorix made his final stand.[3419] No one, however, who has seen the Little Stour at Kingston, the Oze, and the Ozerain, will admit that the Kentish ‘nailbourne’ deserves to be treated as respectfully as the two Burgundian streams.

On the 1st of May, 1902, I walked along the Little Stour from Barham to Bekesbourne. There was not so much as a teaspoonful of water in the channel; and a policeman whom I met near Kingston told me that it had been dry for the last five years. On the other hand, an old labourer, who had lived in the valley for sixty-four years, remarked that he could remember a time when the rivulet often overflowed its banks: on the 18th of April of this year (1904) I myself saw it running past Barham with a strong stream; and a porter at Barham station said, ‘Yes, and it isn’t half as strong as it was a month ago.’ Moreover, Bryan Faussett,[3420] writing between 1767 and 1773, said that the Little Stour about a mile below Kingston was ‘seldom or never dry’; and Philippott,[3421] speaking of Bekesbourne, affirms that in the reign of Edward the Third ‘there was a small navigation out of the river of Stoure up to this place’.

There need be no difficulty, then, in believing that the Little Stour, in Caesar’s day, was a running stream, which he might perhaps have called a _flumen_, though it must not be forgotten that both in 55 B.C. and in the following year, the summer, at all events in Gaul, was exceptionally dry.[3422] Nevertheless, it is certain that the Britons did not encounter Caesar on the Little Stour. Consider the meaning of his words:--_illi equitatu atque essedis ad flumen progressi ex loco superiore nostros prohibere et proelium committere coeperunt_.[3423] At one time I thought that this passage meant, ‘Advancing towards a river with their cavalry and chariots, they attempted from their commanding position (_ex loco superiore_) to check our men,’ &c.: but a passage in the twenty-third chapter of the Second Book of the _Gallic War_--_alia in parte diversae duae legiones, XI et VIII, profligatis Viromanduis, quibuscum erant congressae, ex loco superiore in ipsis fluminis ripis proeliabantur_--in which the words _ex loco superiore_ unquestionably belong to _profligatis_, leads me to believe that the former of the alternative translations which I have given--‘Advancing with their cavalry and chariots from higher ground towards a river, they attempted to check our men,’ &c.--is to be preferred. At all events the _locus superior_ was not without tactical significance, and was either the left bank of the stream or high ground in close proximity to the left bank. Now between Barham and the northern end of Charlton Park, which is below Kingston, the depth of the channel of the Little Stour does not exceed 18 inches; and even at Bekesbourne it is only about two feet. Therefore, unless the depth of the channel was considerably greater in 54 B.C. than it is now, and unless the water flowed considerably below the level of the banks, the words _locus superior_ could not have been applied to the bank itself anywhere between Barham and Bekesbourne.[3424] Moreover, although there are well-defined heights on the left bank between Barham and Bridge, the lowest slopes, except opposite Kingston and for a very short space on either side of it, are at a considerable distance from the channel. Assuming that Caesar crossed the Little Stour at or near Kingston, the Britons could have opposed him more effectually when he was ascending Barham Downs than by attempting to defend the passage of the rivulet. And, since he would in any case be obliged to cross the Stour itself, is it not obvious that they would have waited for him behind the river which might fairly be called an obstacle rather than on the banks of the streamlet which an active lad could have jumped over?

2. If Napoleon’s view is inadmissible, it is difficult to characterize that adopted by the Reverend Francis Vine.[3425] He assures us that Caesar ‘descried the British forces ... lining the crest of the hill (described in the ‘Commentaries’ as “superior locus”) from Garrington (near Littlebourne) on his right hand, to probably the part of Barham Downs opposite Bridge and Bishopsbourne on his left. This was the best position which the Britons could possibly have chosen for the purpose of arresting the progress of an army marching upon Caer Caint (Canterbury)’. In other words, Mr. Vine holds that the Britons awaited Caesar’s approach not on the further but on the nearer side of the river! ‘That the Britons were traditionally reported to have opposed Caesar’s progress _before he reached_ the river, rather than after passing it, may,’ he says, ‘be inferred from the following passage from Pomponius Sabinus, out of Seneca: “And in the night marching twelve miles up into the country, Caesar finds out the Britons, who _retreated as far as the river_, but gave him battle there.”’ So we are to prefer the authority of Seneca to that of the general who fought the battle! Besides, Mr. Vine fails to see that the passage which he quotes (and which is not to be found in Seneca) need only mean that the Britons, when Caesar descried them, had retreated from the seashore to the banks of the river. Why Pomponius Sabinus, an Italian scholar who was born 1,470 years after Caesar died, should be summoned as a witness it is not easy to understand. The only inference which can be deduced from Caesar’s narrative--the only inference which has ever been deduced from it by any scholar--is that the Britons, when Caesar descried them, were on the further side of the river, and that they advanced to its left bank in order to dispute his passage.

Mr. Vine’s view[3426] of the route which Caesar followed appears to be partly based upon ‘traces of encampments which still remain’. But who made them? Certainly not these Britons, who, only a few hours before Caesar began his night march, had retreated from the coast into the interior in order to oppose his progress, and whose stronghold was not on the right but on the left bank of the river. Certainly not Caesar, who, in marching from the coast to encounter the Britons, made no camp at all. The tumuli which have been opened on Kingston Down were, as Roach Smith says, ‘neither more nor less than those of Saxons.’[3427] Mr. Vine[3428] asserts that ‘there were probably two large oblong castra [constructed by Caesar], the one extending along Barham Downs opposite Charlton, the other at the western extremity of the Downs extending over part of Bridge Hill, Bourne Park, and perhaps the grounds of Higham’. But without excavation it would be impossible to prove that any ‘castra’ had been erected on Barham Downs by Caesar; and without going to this trouble any man who can understand the _Commentaries_ may conclude that he certainly did not construct two.

3. Lyon, the author of the _History of the Town and Port of Dover_,[3429] maintains that the combat took place near Littlebourne, about two miles lower down than Bekesbourne; but this place is on the road from Sandwich to Canterbury, and barely nine miles from the former. If Caesar marched along the line of this road, he must have encountered the Britons on the Great Stour near Canterbury. Assuming that he marched from the neighbourhood of Deal, Lyon’s view might perhaps be defended if there were any reason to believe that on the left bank of the Little Stour near Littlebourne there was a stronghold;[3430] but in a former article[3431] I have given cogent reasons for believing that in 54 B.C. Caesar encamped some miles north of Deal.

It may, then, be regarded as morally certain that the river on which the Britons encountered Caesar was the Great Stour. It has, indeed, been objected that the least distance of the Great Stour from Deal is not twelve, but fifteen miles; but while this argument may be valid against the theory that Caesar landed in 54 B.C. at Deal, the position that he defeated the Britons on the Great Stour remains unshaken.

4. The Reverend R. C. Jenkins[3432] holds that the scene of the encounter was Chilham, about six miles above Canterbury, on the Ashford road. ‘The only obstacle,’ he pleads, ‘is the increased distance, which is sixteen, instead of twelve miles ... a difference which the loss of a single stroke might account for [the scribe being supposed to have written XII instead of XVI], if, indeed, it is not sufficiently explained by the possible miscalculation of the time of the march ... everything else falls into perfect harmony with the narrative--the high wooded ground at the back, the steep banks, the wide and rapid stream,’ &c. And again, ‘Let us remember that the journey was during the night, when the ground would be rapidly passed over, and the actual distance would be less apparent ... the space traversed is only described as “milia passuum _circiter_ duodecim”, and even then the position of the enemy was merely discerned afar off ... here we have ancient mounds and earthworks, which give silent testimony to the fact that Chilham was a military position of the highest importance even during the British period.’[3433]

These arguments have no weight. When numbers attested by the consensus of the _MSS._ are not manifestly wrong, we have no right to distort them into agreement with our own preferences. The distance, in a straight line, from the nearest point on which Caesar could have encamped, if he had landed near Sandwich,[3434] to Chilham, is about 20 Roman miles; from the place where he would have encamped if he had landed near Deal,[3435] approximately 16; and the actual distance which he would have had to march is of course considerably longer. Why he should have marched more rapidly by night than by day it would be difficult to explain;[3436] and the remark that ‘the position of the enemy was merely discerned afar off’ is a pure invention. If ‘we have ancient mounds and earthworks’ at Chilham, they prove nothing about Caesar;[3437] and we have them also at other places near the course of the river. Besides, why should Caesar have made a forced march in order to cross the Stour at Chilham when, by making an ordinary march of 12 miles, he could have crossed it near Canterbury?[3438]

Our search for the site is now confined within narrow limits. Below Fordwich, the Stour, in Caesar’s time, would certainly have been impassable in the face of an enemy; for it flowed through a broad morass.[3439] Between Canterbury and the bridge above Sturry the river is virtually flush with its banks. It appears to me, then, that Caesar must have crossed it either between Fordwich and Sturry, or in the neighbourhood of Thanington, just above Canterbury, or possibly at Canterbury itself. Above Canterbury it flows through nearly level meadows: its width is about 15 or 16 yards: the banks are about 2 feet high; and the depth of the water at present is apparently about 2 feet. The bottom at the bridge above Thanington is sandy and gravelly. Opposite this point and at a distance of, say, 600 yards, the ground begins to rise into wooded heights. Opposite Thanington, and east of it, the heights are considerably nearer the river; but they gradually sink as they approach Canterbury.

At Sturry the lower slopes of the low hills which extend along the northern side of the valley approach very close to the river, say to within 100 yards; but opposite Fordwich they are much further away. Just below the mill at Sturry the Stour is from 15 to 20 yards wide: the banks are 3 or 4 feet above the water: the average depth is apparently from about 18 inches to 2 feet; and the bottom is sand mixed with stones. At Fordwich the depth of the water, as seen from the bridge, is about 5 feet: the banks are 4 or 5 feet above the water; and the bottom from this point downwards is mud.

5. The eminent geographer, Major Rennell,[3440] believed that Caesar crossed at the place where ‘the western road intersects the course of the Stour’; but he gave no reasons for preferring this site to Fordwich, Sturry, or Thanington.

6. Von Göler[3441] and Guest[3442] maintain that the battle was fought at or near Sturry; and Heller[3443] appears to agree with them. So does Roach Smith,[3444] who, at Guest’s request, made ‘a survey of the vicinity of Grove Ferry’, which survey, I presume, extended as far up the river as Sturry. ‘There,’ he says, ‘I found the river with the high bank ... the woods and _oppidum_,’[3445] &c. Napoleon[3446] argues that the banks at Sturry are so steep that the Roman cavalry could not have forced a passage without great difficulty, whereas it would appear from Caesar’s account that they crossed easily; and also that Sturry is 15, not 12 miles from Deal. The latter objection may be disposed of at once. Napoleon himself maintains that Caesar’s anchorage in 54 B.C. was ‘some kilometres’ north of the spot where he had landed in the preceding year;[3447] and this spot he rightly fixes between Walmer and Deal. Therefore the place from which Caesar descried the Britons just before they advanced to the bank of the stream was not 12 miles from Deal, but, as I have shown in a previous article,[3448] from a point in the neighbourhood of Sandwich. Certainly it would have been more difficult to force the passage of the Stour at Sturry than of the Little Stour near Kingston; but, as we have seen, the latter would practically have presented no obstacle at all. Airy,[3449] who holds that if the Britons had been posted on the Stour at all, ‘Caesar would have crossed at the sound ground of Canterbury or above it,’ observes that ‘the place had been selected by the Britons as a defensive post at least two days previously, and may therefore be presumed to have had the qualifications necessary for a defensive post, namely that it could not be turned, and that enemies could attack it in front only at a disadvantage’; and, remarking that ‘there can scarcely be a doubt that Canterbury existed then as an important town’, he adds that ‘of this there is no mention in Caesar’. But why should Caesar have mentioned Canterbury? It was not a strategical point: there was nothing to be gained by attacking it except perhaps a little plunder; and anything worth plundering would certainly have been removed into the stronghold which he did attack. ‘The place [on the banks of the river] had been selected [or, at all events, occupied] as a defensive post’ not two days but one day previously; and, generally speaking, to select a defensive post on a river which cannot be turned is impossible.[3450] The stronghold to which the Britons retreated was probably, as Mr. George Payne holds,[3451] and as I have shown in my narrative,[3452] the British _oppidum_ in Bigberry (or Bigbury) woods, about a mile and a half west of Canterbury, of which traces still exist; and it seems most likely that the passage of the river took place at some point between Canterbury and Thanington.

CAESAR’S EARLIER OPERATIONS IN 54 B. C. (_B. G._, V, 9-11)