Himilco was a Carthaginian who was engaged in the Phœnician maritime trade in the sixth century, and the traditionary account of his voyage is preserved by a comparatively late writer, Festus Rufus Avienus. In his poetical Description of the World, written from the account of Himilco, he mentions the plains of the Britons and the distant Thule, and talks of the sacred isle peopled by the nation of the Hiberni and the adjacent island of the Albiones.[[23]]
Pytheas was a Massilian. His account of his journey is preserved by the geographer Strabo, and appears to have been received with great distrust. He stated that he had sailed round Spain and the half of Britain; ascertained that the latter was an island; made a voyage of six days to the island of Thule, and then returned. From him Strabo, Diodorus Siculus, and Pliny derived their information as to the size of the islands, and his statement made known for the first time the names of three promontories—Cantium or Kent, Belerium or Land’s End, and Orcas, or that opposite the Orkneys.[[24]]
But although the existence of the British Isles was thus known at an early period to the classic writers under specific names, and some slender information acquired through the medium of the early tin trade as to their position and magnitude, it was not till the progress of the Roman arms and their lust of conquest had brought their legions into actual contact with the native population, that any information as to the inhabitants of these islands was obtained.
B.C. 55.
Invasion of Julius Cæsar.
The invasion of Britain by Julius Cæsar in the year 55 before the Christian era, although it added no new territory to the already overgrown empire of the Romans, and was probably undertaken more with the view of adding to the military renown of the great commander, for the first time made the Romans acquainted with some of the tribes inhabiting that, to them, distant and almost inaccessible isle, and added distinctness and definiteness to their previously vague conception of its characteristics. Its existence was now not merely a geographical speculation, but a political fact in the estimation of those by whom the destinies of the world were then swayed—an element that might possibly enter into their political combinations.
The conquests of Julius Cæsar in Britain, limited in extent and short-lived in duration, were not followed up. The policy of the subsequent emperors involved the neglect of Britain as an object of conquest; and, while it now assumed a more definite position in the writings of Greek and Roman geographers, they have left us nothing but the names of a few southern tribes and localities which do not concern the object before us, and a statement regarding the general population which is of more significance.
Cæsar sums up his account by telling us that the interior of Britain was inhabited by those who were considered to be indigenous, and the maritime part by those who had passed over from Belgium, the memory of whose emigration was preserved by their new insular possessions bearing the same name with the continental states from which they sprang. He describes the country as very populous, the people as pastoral, but using iron and brass, and the inhabitants of the interior as less civilised than those on the coasts. The former he paints as clothed in skins, and as not resorting to the cultivation of the soil for food, but as dependent upon their cattle and the flesh of animals slain in hunting for subsistence. He ascribes to all those customs which seem to have been peculiar to the Britons. They stained their bodies with woad, which gave them a green colour, from which the Britons were termed ‘Virides’ and ‘Cærulei.’ They had wives in common. They used chariots in war, and Cæsar bears testimony to the bravery with which they defended their woods and rude fortresses, as well as encountered the disciplined Roman troops in the field. He mentions the island Hibernia as less than Britannia by one-half, and about as far from it as the latter is from Gaul, and an island termed ‘Mona’ in the middle of the channel between the two larger islands.[[25]]
Strabo and Diodorus Siculus have preserved any additional accounts of the inhabitants which the Romans received during the succeeding reigns of Augustus and Tiberius. They describe the Britons as taller than the Gauls, with hair less yellow, and slighter in their persons; and Strabo distinguishes between that portion of them whose manners resembled those of the Gauls and those who were more simple and barbarous, and were unacquainted with agriculture—manifestly the inhabitants of the interior whom Cæsar considered to be indigenous. He describes the peculiarity of their warfare, their use of chariots, and their towns as enclosures made in the forests, with ramparts of hewn trees. He mentions the inhabitants of ‘Ierne’ as more barbarous, regarding whom reports of cannibalism and the promiscuous intercourse of the sexes were current.[[26]] Diodorus gives a more favourable picture of the inhabitants who were considered to be the aborigines of the island, and attributes to them the simple virtues of the pure and early state of society fabled by the poets. He alludes to their use of chariots and their simple huts, and adds to Strabo’s account that they stored the ears of corn under ground. He represents them as simple, frugal, and peaceful in their mode of life. Those near the promontory of Belerion or Land’s End he describes as more civilised, owing to their intercourse with strangers.[[27]]
Thus all agree in distinguishing between the simple and rude inhabitants of the interior, who were considered to be indigenous, and the more civilised people of the eastern and southern shores who were believed to have passed over from Gaul.
A.D. 43.
Formation of province in reign of Claudius.