The Romans kept possession of the island for nearly four hundred years. They did not leave it until 410, the year that Alaric sacked the city of Rome. At this time the Roman legions were withdrawn from Britain.
Some years before this the Saxons, Angles and Jutes, German tribes, had settled near the shores of the North Sea. They learned much about Britain; for trading vessels, even at that early day, crossed the Channel. Among other things, the men from the north learned that Britain was crossed with good Roman roads, and dotted with houses of brick and stone; that walled cities had taken the place of tented camps, and that the country for miles round each city was green every spring with waving wheat, or white with orchard blossoms.
| HENGIST AND HORSA LANDING IN ENGLAND |
After the Roman legions had left Britain, the Jutes, led, it is said, by two great captains named Hengist and Horsa, landed upon the southeastern coast and made a settlement.
Britain proved a pleasant place to live in, and soon the Angles and Saxons also left the North Sea shores and invaded the beautiful island.
The new invaders met with brave resistance. The Britons were headed by King Arthur, about whom many marvelous stories are told. His court was held at Caerleon (cär'le-on), in North Wales, where his hundred and fifty knights banqueted at their famous "Round Table."
The British king and his knights fought with desperate heroism. But they could not drive back the Saxons and their companions and were obliged to seek refuge in the western mountainous parts of the island, just as their forefathers had done when the Romans invaded Britain. Thus nearly all England came into the possession of the three invading tribes.
II
Arthur and his knights were devoted Christians. For the Romans had not only made good roads and built strong walls and forts in Britain, but they had also brought the Christian religion into the island. And at about the time of the Saxon invasion St. Patrick was founding churches and monasteries in Ireland, and was baptizing whole clans of the Irish at a time. It is said that he baptized 12,000 persons with his own hand. Missionaries were sent out by the Irish Church to convert the wild Picts of Scotland and at a later day the distant barbarians of Germany and Switzerland.
The Saxons, Angles, and Jutes believed in the old Norse gods, and Tiew and Woden, Thor and Friga, or Frija, were worshiped on the soil of Britain for more than a hundred years.