Of this common stock the British branch, at least, must have been developed on the continent. (See [Chapter VI].)
This, of course, assumes that the Galli of Gaul were not derived from Britain; a view which has never been adopted, and which probably has so little to recommend it as to make its investigation superfluous.
The British language of Britain and the Gaelic of Gaul would not have been so much alike as they were had they developed themselves separately, each after their own fashion.
This last proposition depends, however, to a great extent, upon the following, viz., that—
IV.
The similarity between the ancient language of Gaul and the ancient language of Britain is measured by that between the present Welsh and the Armorican of Brittany.
The arguments of pp. [86-87], resting as they do upon the close relationship between the ancient[222] language of Gaul[24] and the British—would be materially impaired by any thing which subtracted from the evidence in favour of that relationship.
Now the present Welsh and the present Armorican of Brittany are languages that are very nearly mutually intelligible.
And as the Armorican represents the ancient Gallic, and the Welsh the ancient British, the affinity between the two old tongues must have been, at least, equal to that between the two new ones.
But what if the Armorican do not represent the ancient Gallic, but be merely so much Welsh or Cornish transferred to Brittany in the fifth century? In such a case the argument is materially weakened.