Chapter XXVI: Preface

We have thought proper to add as a supplement to the description of ancient Britain in the same summary manner--I. An epitome of chronology from the creation to the sack of Rome by the Goths: II. A short account of the Roman emperors, and governors, who presided over this country: III. Some persons will perhaps say that this kind of work is not absolutely necessary either for divine worship or greater things. But let them know that leisure hours may be dedicated to the study of the antiquities of our country without any derogation from the sacred character. Yet if censorious people envy us such pleasures at leisure hours, hastening to the end and almost arrived at the goal, we here check our steps.

CHAP. I.

IV. In the beginning, the Almighty Creator made this world, inhabited by us and other creatures, out of nothing, in the space of six days.

V. In the year of the world 1656, the Creator, to punish the increasing wickedness of mankind, sent a flood upon the earth, which, overwhelming the whole world, destroyed every living creature except those which had entered the ark, and whose progeny replenished the new world with colonies of living beings.

VI. 3000. About this time some persons affirm that Britain was cultivated and first inhabited, when it was visited by the Greek and Phoenician merchants. Nor are those wanting who believe that London was shortly after built by a king called Bryto.

VII. 3228. The brothers Romulus and Remus laid the foundation of Rome, which in time became the common terror of all nations.

VIII. 3600. The Senones, having emigrated from Britain, passed through Gaul, with the intent to invade Italy and attack Rome.

IX. 3650. The Belgae entered this country, and the Celta occupied the region deserted by the Senones. Divitiacus king of the AEdui soon afterwards passed over with an army and subdued great part of this kingdom. About this time the Britons who were expelled by the Belgae emigrated to Ireland, formed a settlement, and were thenceforward called Scoti.

X. 3943. Cassibelinus waged war with the maritime states.[683]

XI. 3946. Caesar overcame the Germans, Gauls, and also the Britons, to whom, before this time, even the name of the Romans was unknown. The conqueror, having received hostages, rendered the people tributary.

XII. 3947. At length coming a second time into this country, upon the invitation, as he pretended, of the Trinobantes, he waged war with Cassibelinus king of the Cassii. Suetonius, however, asserts, with greater probability, that he was allured by the costly pearls of Britain.

XIII. 4044. The emperor Claudius passed over to Britain, and in the space of six months, almost without effusion of blood, reduced a great part of the island, which he ordered to be called Caesariensis.

XIV. 4045. Vespasian, at that time in a private station, being sent by the emperor Claudius with the second legion into this country, attacked the Belgae and Damnonii, and having fought thirty-two battles and taken twenty cities, reduced them under the Roman power, together with the Isle of Wight.

XV. 4047. The Romans occupied Thermae and Glebon.

XVI. 4050. Ostorius the Roman general, after a war of nine years, overcame Caractacus king of the Silures, great part of Britain was reduced into a province, and the colony of Camalodunum founded.

XVII. 4052. Certain cities of the Belgae were yielded by the Romans to Cogibundus, that he might form a kingdom. About this time the Cangi and Brigantes went over and settled in Ireland.

XVIII. 4061. The emperor Nero, having no courage for military enterprises, nearly lost Britain; for under him its two greatest cities were taken and destroyed. Bonduica, in order to revenge the injury offered to her by the Romans, rose in arms, burned the Roman colonies of London, Camalodunum, and the municipal town Verulamium, and slew more than eighty thousand Roman citizens. She was at length overcome by Suetonius, who amply avenged the loss, by slaughtering an equal number of her subjects.

XIX. 4073. Cerealis conquered the Brigantes.

XX. 4076. Frontinus punished the Ordovices.

XXI. 4080. Agricola after a severe engagement subdued Galgacus king of the Caledonians. He ordered all the island to be examined by a fleet, and having sailed round its coasts, added the Orcades to the Roman empire.

XXII. 4120. The emperor Hadrian himself came into the island, and separated one part of it from the other by an immense wall.

XXIII. 4140. Urbicus being sent hither by Antoninus Pius, distinguished himself by his victories.

XXIV. 4150. Aurelius Antoninus also obtained victories over some of the Britons.

XXV. 4160. Britain was enlightened by the introduction of Christianity, during the reign of Lucius, who first submitted himself to the cross of Christ.

XXVI. 4170. The Romans were driven from the Vespasian province. About this time it is supposed that king Reuda came with his people, the Picts, from the islands into Britain.

XXVII. 4207. The emperor Severus, passing over into Britain, repaired the wall built by the Romans, which had been ruined, and died not long after, by the visitation of God, at York.

XXVIII. 4211. Bassianus (Caracalla) obtained a venal peace from the Maeatae.

XXIX. 4220. During these times the Roman armies confined themselves within the wall, and all the island enjoyed a profound peace.

XXX. 4290. Carausius, having assumed the purple, seized upon Britain; but ten years afterwards it was recovered by Asclepiodotus.

XXXI. 4304. A cruel and inveterate persecution, in which within the space of a month seventeen thousand martyrs suffered in the cause of Christ. This persecution spread over the sea, and the Britons, Alban, Aaron, and Julius, with great numbers of men and women, were condemned to a happy death.

XXXII. 4306. Constantius, a man of the greatest humanity, having conquered Allectus, died at Eboracum in the sixteenth year of his reign.

XXXIII. 4307. Constantine, afterwards called the Great, son of Constantius by Helena, a British woman, was created emperor in Britain; and Ireland voluntarily became tributary to him.

XXXIV. 4320. The Scoti entered Britain under the conduct of the king Fergusius, and here fixed their residence.

XXXV. Theodosius slew Maximus the tyrant three miles from Aquileia. Maximus having nearly drained Britain of all its warlike youth, who followed the footsteps of his tyranny over Gaul, the fierce transmarine nations of the Scots from the south, and the Picts from the north, perceiving the island without soldiers and defenceless, oppressed it and laid it waste during a long series of years.

XXXVI. 4396. The Britons indignantly submitting to the attacks of the Scots and Picts, sent to Rome, made an offer of submission, and requested assistance against their enemies. A legion being accordingly despatched to their assistance, slew a great multitude of the barbarians, and drove the remainder beyond the confines of Britain. The legion, upon its departure homewards, advised its allies to construct a wall between the two estuaries, to restrain the enemy. A wall was accordingly made in an unskilful manner, with a greater proportion of turf than stone, which was of no advantage; for on the departure of the Romans the former enemies returned in ships, slew, trampled on, and devoured all things before them like a ripened harvest.

XXXVII. 4400. Assistance being again entreated, the Romans came, and with the aid of the Britons drove the enemy beyond sea, and built a wall from sea to sea, not as before with earth, but with solid stone, between the fortresses erected in that part to curb the enemy. On the southern coast, where an invasion of the Saxons was apprehended, he erected watch towers. This was the work of Stilicho, as appears from Claudian.

XXXVIII. 4411. Rome, the seat of the fourth and greatest of the monarchies, was seized by the Goths, as Daniel prophesied, in the year one thousand one hundred and sixty-four after its foundation.

From this time ceased the Roman empire in Britain, four hundred and sixty-five years after the arrival of Julius Caesar.

XXXIX. 4446. The Roman legion retiring from Britain, and refusing to return, the Scots and Picts ravaged all the island from the north as far as the wall, the guards of which being slain, taken prisoners, or driven away, and the wall itself broken through, the predatory enemy then poured into the country. An epistle was sent filled with tears and sorrows to Fl. AEtius, thrice consul, in the twenty-third year of Theodosius, begging the assistance of the Roman power, but without effect.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 683: Probably from Caesar, though the precise date seems to be fixed without authority.--_Caes. de Bell. Gall. lib._ v., Sec. 9.]

CHAP. II.

1. Having followed truth as far as possible, if any thing should occur not strictly consistent with it, I request it may not be imputed to me as a fault. Confining myself closely to the rules and laws of history, I have collected all the accounts of other persons which I found most accurate and deserving of credit. The reader must not expect any thing beyond an enumeration of those emperors and Roman governors who had authority over this island. With an account of these I shall close my book.

2. Julius Caesar the dictator was the first of the Romans who invaded Britain with an army, during the reign of Cassibelinus; but, although he defeated the inhabitants in one battle, and occupied the coast, as Tacitus observes, he rather seems to have shown the way to his successors than to have given them possession.

3. In a short time the civil wars succeeding, the arms of the chiefs were turned against the republic. Britain was also long neglected by the advice of Augustus and the command of Tiberius. It is certain that Caligula intended to enter Britain; but his quick temper and proneness to change, or the unsuccessful attempts against the Germans, prevented him.

4. Claudius, however, carried war into Britain which no Roman emperor since Julius Caesar had reached, and, having transported his legions and allies without danger or bloodshed, in a few days reduced a part of the island. He afterwards sent over Vespasian, at that time in a private station, who fought two and thirty battles with the enemy, and added to the Roman empire two very powerful nations, with their kings, twenty cities, and the isle of Vecta, contiguous to Britain. He overcame the remainder by means of Cneas Sentius and Aulus Plautius. For these exploits he obtained a great triumph.

5. To him succeeded Ostorius Scapula, a man famous in war, who reduced the nearest part of Britain into a province, and added the colony of the veterans, Camalodunum. Certain cities were delivered up to the chief Cogibundus, who, according to Tacitus, remained faithful till the accession of Trajan to the empire.

6. Avitus Didius Gallus kept possession of what his predecessors had acquired, a few posts only being removed further into the interior, in order to obtain the credit of extending his dominion.

7. Didius Verannius, who succeeded, died within a year.

8. Suetonius Paulinus continued prosperous for two years. The tribes being reduced and garrisons established, he attacked the isle of Mona, because it gave succour to the rebellious and afforded opportunities for invasion. For the absence of the governor removing all fear, the Britons began to recover courage, and rose in arms under the conduct of Bonduica, a woman of royal descent. Having reduced the troops scattered in the garrisons, they attacked the colony[684] itself, as the seat of slavery, and in the height of rage and victory, exercised every species of savage barbarity. Had not Paulinus, on receiving the intelligence, luckily hastened to crush the revolt, Britain must have been lost. But the fortune of one battle restored it to its former submission. Many of the natives, from the consciousness of their defection, and fear of the governor, continued under arms.

9. Suetonius, in other respects an illustrious man, but arrogant to the vanquished and prompt to avenge his own injuries, being likely to exercise severity, he was replaced by Petronius Turpilianus, who was more merciful, a stranger to the offences of the enemy, and therefore more likely to be softened by their repentance. Having settled the disturbances, he gave up the province to Trebellius Maximus.

10. Trebellius, being of a slothful disposition and unused to war, retained the province by gentleness. The barbarous Britons ceasing to be ignorant of luxury, and the termination of civil wars, gave him an excuse for inactivity. But discord called forth his exertions; for the soldiery, when released from military labours, grew wanton from too much rest. Trebellius, having evaded the rage of the army by flight, was shortly allowed to resume the command, the licentiousness of the soldiery becoming as it were a composition for the safety of the general. This sedition ended without bloodshed.

11. Nor did Vectius Bolanus, although the civil wars still continued, harass Britain by restoring discipline. There was the same inactivity towards the enemy, and the same insubordination in the garrisons; but Bolanus, being a good man and not disliked, acquired affection instead of authority.

12. But when, with the rest of the world, Vespasian had recovered Britain, we see distinguished generals, famous armies, and the enemy dispirited: Petilius Cerealis immediately excited terror by attacking the state of the Brigantes, which was esteemed the most populous of the province. Many battles were fought, some of which were bloody, and a great part of the Brigantian territory was either conquered or invaded.

13. But although Cerealis had diminished the care and fame of his successor, the burden was sustained by Julius Frontinus, a man of high courage. Overcoming at once the spirit of the enemy and the difficulties of the country, he subjugated the warlike and powerful nation of the Silures.

14. To him succeeded Agricola, who not only maintained the peace of the province; but for seven years carried on war against the Caledonians and their warlike king Galgacus. He thus added to the Roman empire nations hitherto unknown.

15. But Domitian, envying the superior glory of Agricola, recalled him, and sent his lieutenant Lucullus into Britain, because he had suffered lances of a new form to be named _Luculleas_ after him.

16. His successor was Trebellius, under whom the two provinces, namely, Vespasiana and Maeata, were wrested from the Roman government; for the Romans gave themselves up to luxury.

17. About this time the emperor Hadrian visiting this island, erected a wall justly wonderful, and left Julius Severus his deputy in Britain.

18. From this time nothing worthy of attention is related, until Antoninus Pius carried on so many wars by his generals. He conquered the Britons by means of Lollius Urbicus, the propraetor, and Saturninus, prefect of the fleet, and, the barbarians being driven back, another wall was built. He recovered the province afterwards called Valentia.

19. Pius dying, Aurelius Antoninus gained many victories over the Britons and Germans.

20. On the death of Antoninus, when the Romans deemed their acquisitions insufficient, they suffered a great defeat under Marcellus.

21. To him succeeded Pertinax, who conducted himself as an able general.

22. The next was Clodius Albinus, who contended with Severus for the sceptre and purple.

23. After these, the first who enjoyed the title of lieutenant was Virius Lupus: he did not perform many splendid actions; for his glory was intercepted by the unconquerable Severus, who, having rapidly put the enemy to flight, repaired the wall of Hadrian, now become ruinous, and restored it to its former perfection. Had he lived, he intended to extirpate the very name of the barbarians; but he died by the visitation of God, among the Brigantes, in the city of Eboracum.

24. Alexander succeeded, who gained some victories in the East, and died at Edessa.

25. His successors were the lieutenants Lucilianus, M. Furius, N. Philippus *********, who, if we except the preservation of the boundaries, performed hardly any thing worthy of notice.

26. Afterwards *****

_The rest is wanting._

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 684: Camalodunum.]