Prichard, who drew attention to this remarkable compound, having stated that a passage in Pliny informed us that the Cimbri called the sea in their neighbourhood Mori-marusa, inferred that the name was Cimbric; and further argued, that as mor mawth in Welsh meant the same, the Cimbric tongue was Welsh, Cambrian, or British. As far as it went the inference was truly legitimate; but the reasoning which led to it was deficient. The likelihood of there being more languages than one wherein both mor meant sea, and mor meant dead, was overlooked; though one of the languages that supplied the coincidence was the Latin—mare mort-uum.
Another such a tongue was the Slavonic; and to that tongue I imagine Morimarusa to be referrible. I also imagine that by the Cimbri of Pliny were meant the Cimmerii; so that the Sea of Azof was the true Dead Sea; or, perhaps, the Propontis; in which case its present name, the Sea of Marmora, is explained.
The name of the Province, Ar-mor-ica, means the country on the sea, and if rendered in Latin would be ad mare. Ar-gail is such another word; and it was the name of the landing-place of the Gael=ad Gallos.
To the Gaelic Ar-mor-ica, the Slavonians have an exact parallel in the word Po-mor-ania; where po means on, and mor the sea.
CHAPTER IV.
THE PICTS.—LIST OF KINGS.—PENN FAHEL.—ABER AND INVER.—THE PICTS PROBABLY, BUT NOT CERTAINLY, BRITONS.
The Picts have never been considered Romans; but, with that exception, a relationship with every population of the British Isles has been claimed for them. As Germans on the strength of Tacitus' description of their physical conformation of the Caledonian, and as Germans on the strength of the supposed Germanic origin of the Belgæ, the Picts have been held the ancestors of the present Lowland Scotch. They have been considered Scandinavians also. On the other hand, they have been made Gaels, in which case it is the Highlanders who are their offspring. They have been considered Britons, and they have been considered a separate stock.
That they were Kelts rather than Germans is the commonest doctrine, and that they were Britons rather than Gaels is a common one; the arguments that prove the latter proving the first a fortiori.