Minus triennium. Quam omitted. See H. 417, 3; Z. 485.
Comitante opinione. A general expectation attending him, as it were, on his return.
Nullis sermonibus. Ablative of cause.
Elegit. Perf. to denote what has in fact taken place.
X. In comparationem. Cf. in suam famam, 8, note.
Perdomita est. Completely subdued.
Rerum fide==faithfully and truly; lit. with fidelity to facts.
Britannia. It has generally been supposed (though Gesenius denies it in his Phenician Paloeography) that Britain was known to the Phenicians, those bold navigators and enterprising merchants of antiquity, under the name of the Cassiterides, or Tin Islands. Greek authors make early mention of Albion (plural of Alp?) and Ierne (Erin) as British Islands. Bochart derives the name (Britain) from the Phenician or Hebrew Baratanae, "the Land of Tin;" others from the Gallic Britti, Painted, in allusion to the custom among the inhabitants of painting their bodies. But according to the Welsh Triads, Britain derived its name from Prydain, a king, who early reigned in the island. Cf. Turner's His. Ang. Sax. 1, 2, seqq. The geographical description, which follows, cannot be exonerated from the charge of verbiage and grandiloquence. T. wanted the art of saying a plain thing plainly.
Spatio ac coelo. Brit. not only stretches out or lies over against these several countries in situation, but it approaches them also in climate: a circumstance which illustrates the great size of the island (cf. maxima, above) and prepares the way for the description of both below.
Germaniae and Hispaniae are dat. after obtenditur. The mistaken notion of the relative position of Spain and Britain is shared with T. by Caesar (B.G. 13), Dion (39, 50), and indeed by the ancients in general. It is so represented in maps as late as Richard of Cirencester. Cf. Prichard, III. 3, 9.