About twenty years after Hadrian’s expedition, Lollius Urbicus took the command in Britain. He was not satisfied with the limits which Hadrian had prudently assigned to the empire in Britain. Forcing back the Britons, he raised an earthen rampart across the isthmus between the Forth and the Clyde. Graham’s Dike, in Scotland, is the wall which was built by Lollius Urbicus. This is proved by the numerous sculptures which have, at different times, been discovered among its ruins.
DECLINE OF THE ROMAN POWER.
The remaining history of the Romans, on the northern frontier of England, is fraught with disaster. The tide of war sometimes broke upon the northern, and sometimes on the southern boundary; but its roar and its devastation ceased not, until the Roman intruder had been driven altogether from the island—or, rather, until the successive strifes of Romans and Picts, Normans and Saxons, Border reavers and Scottish troopers, had been hushed, under the vigorous rule of the last of the Tudors. What Hadrian could not do, for the inhabitants of the North of England; what Severus failed to accomplish; what the great Alfred—the Norman oppressor—the Plantagenets—the despotic Henry VIII., attempted in vain, was accomplished under what John Knox calls ‘the monstrous regiment of a woman.’ Then, a ‘bright occidental star’ beamed upon these Northern Parts, and Law began to assert its supremacy.
Marcus Antoninus, who succeeded Antoninus Pius, was far from enjoying the tranquillity which the northern rampart was expected to give. He was obliged to carry on very troublesome wars with the Britons, and with much difficulty kept them in check.
THE BRITONS PREVAIL.
In the reign of Commodus, who became sole emperor A.D. 180, the Britons, as we are told by Xiphiline, who abridged the history of Dion, broke through the wall which separated them from the Roman province, killed the general, ruined the army, and, in their ravages, carried everything before them. The wall referred to, was probably that of the Lower Isthmus; for, as Horsley conjectures, "the Caledonians had broken through the wall of Antoninus Pius not long after it was erected," and certain it is, "that we meet with no inscriptions on the wall of Antoninus but what belong to his reign."
The circumstance, that the loathsome and ferocious Commodus assumed the title of Britannicus, is no proof that success attended his arms. He was the first person who had ascribed to him the conjoined titles of Pius and Felix; but, as Lampridius satirically observes, "When he had appointed the adulterer of his mother a consul, he was called Pius; when he had slain Perennis, he was called Felix; and when the Britons were ready to choose another emperor, he was flattered with the title of Britannicus."
During the time that Septimius Severus, Pescennius Niger, and Clodius Albinus contended with each other for the empire, the northern Britons were held feebly in check. At length, A.D. 197, Severus prevailed, and became sole master of the world. Virius Lupus became his proprætor in Britain. Unable to resist the attacks of the Caledonians in the field, and having in vain attempted to purchase their submission with money, his lieutenant sent hasty letters to the emperor, entreating succour, and, if possible, his presence.
It is stated by Richard of Cirencester, that about this time the Picts, a tribe to which reference will presently be made, first landed in Scotland. The extraordinary successes, as Dr. Giles remarks, which the Caledonians gained, prior to the arrival of Severus, confirm the supposition that they received considerable reinforcements from abroad.