CHAP. II.
Of Marshland and the adjoining parts, or Great Fen Country.—View of their situation and revolutions in remote ages, or Sketch of their ancient history.
Section I.
Account of their state before and after the arrival of the Romans—Character of that people—establishment of their power here—improvements made by them in these parts.
As Lynn may be considered as the Capital or Metropolis of Marshland and the Fens, it will not be improper to give here some account of those remarkable districts from the earliest times. All this flat and level country is thought to have been originally a vast forest, which was afterwards in some measure cleared, and converted into good cultivated land, fertile fields, rich pastures, and numerous habitations of industrious men. After that however, it was, it seems, for no short period, covered by the sea, occasioned, perhaps, by an earthquake, or some such convulsive event, which might considerably lower or sink the whole surface of the country, and so make way for the violent influx of the ocean. The overflowing waters in time gradually covering the original surface of the ground with silt and sand to a very great depth, or rather height, would at last recede. The present face of the country, composed of silt to a vast depth,(and which seems no other than marine sediment) confirms this hypothesis. Still however the parts next the sea, such as Marshland and the low-lands on the eastern side of Lincolnshire would remain as a great salt marsh, occasionally overflowed, especially at spring-tides.—This seems to have been the case when Julius Cæsar invaded this country, and when Claudius afterwards reduced it to the state of a Roman Province.
The Romans, with all their faults, were certainly a wonderful people. Like all other invaders and conquerors they were in general very hard masters, and in some respects most vile oppressors and tyrants. In other respects, however, they may be said to have been eventually real benefactors to many, if not to most of the countries and nations which they subdued, as they were the means of greatly improving those countries, and of introducing among their inhabitants the rudiments of useful knowledge, habits of industry, and the laws of civilization.
Julius Cæsar’s invasion of Britain seems to have proved upon the whole unsuccessful; for he withdrew to the continent, without being able to effect its subjugation, or to retain the conquests which he is supposed to have made; which may be thought to furnish a pretty strong argument in favour of the independent spirit, and high military character of the British nation at that time. Nor does it appear that the Romans ever attempted to give our ancestors any further disturbance afterward, till the reign of Claudius, whose general, Aulus Plautius, a person of senatorial dignity, was the first that established the power of that people, or gave them a firm footing in this island. This was near a hundred years after the retreat or departure of Julius Cæsar; and the success of Plautius is said to have been chiefly or greatly owing to the bitter dissentions which then raged among the British chieftains, some of whom had invited the Romans hither, and afterward joined them against their own country-men. Claudius himself came over sometime after, and completed the conquest of a great part of South Britain, including, it seems, the country of the Iceni, which comprehended the present counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, with most, if not the whole of those of Cambridge and Huntingdon, and probably some part of Lincolnshire. So that the parts adjoining the Fens became subject to the Romans among their earliest acquisitions in Britain. The inhabitants of these parts are also said to have made the least resistance to them, at first, of any of the British States, and therefore to have been for sometime more highly favoured by them than any of the rest. Claudius at his departure from this island, which is said to have been in the year 43 of the Christian Era, left here a considerable force under Plautius, Vespasian (afterwards emperor) and other experienced and able Generals, who were succeeded by others, no way their inferiors, in experience, ability, or military fame; among whom were Ostorius Scapula, Suetonius Paulinus, and Julius Agricola. Besides Julius Cæsar, Claudius, and Vespasian, several others of the Roman emperors are said to have spent some part of their time in this island; and particular Hadrian, Severus, Constantius Chlorus, and his son Constantine the Great. The latter is supposed to have been born here, and his mother is said to have been a Briton. His father, as well as his predecessor Severus, died at York, a place of no small consequence and celebrity in those times.
After the country was reduced, and made a part or province of the empire, the Romans soon began to view it as a very important acquisition. Accordingly they set in good earnest about improving it; and there are still to be seen numerous proofs and monuments of their laborious, ingenious, and successful exertions. Among their important improvements here were included the draining of the Fens, and the embanking of the Marshes, to secure them against the violence and destructive inroads of the ocean. Marshland and the low lands of Lincolnshire, as was before observed, they found in the miserable condition of a salt marsh, occasionally and frequently overflowed by the tides. This country they secured by very strong and extensive embankments, which bear their name to this day. [35a]
These improvements in the Fens and Marshes are said to have been the works of a colony of foreigners, [35b] brought over, probably, from Belgium, a country of a similar description, whose natives, from their previous knowledge and habits, would be eminently fitted for such employments. Not that those works can be supposed to have been effected without the powerful co-operation of the native Britons, who would sometimes loudly complain of the hardships they endured in labours of this kind, imposed upon them by the Romans: a plain proof that they bore their full share of them. Catus Decianus, it seems, was the name of the Roman officer who had the chief direction or superintendence of the improvements then projected and carried on in the Fens. [36] He was probably the first Roman Procurator of the province of the Iceni, and continued to be so for many years. Some things recorded of him, during his government here exhibit him in a very unamiable and detestable light; and it may be presumed that he was an unfeeling and severe task-master to the workmen whom he employed in the fens and marshes, as well as elsewhere; so that we need not wonder that they should sometimes loudly complain of the hardships they underwent. The public works of which he had the direction and superintendence seem, however, to have been carried on by him with no small energy and effect, and to have been soon brought to a state of considerable forwardness and perfection.
The Fens must have been in a very dismal state before the arrival of the Romans; and their exertions, undoubtedly, wrought a mighty, and most happy change in the face of the country. Houses, villages, and towns would now appear in places that were before perfectly desolate and dreary. At this period we may venture to date the origin of Lynn; for it may be pretty safely concluded that it owes its rise to the schemes formed by the Romans for the recovery and improvement of these fens and marshes. It is also very probable, not only that it was the first town built in these parts, on that occasion, but also that it was built and inhabited by those foreign colonists above mentioned, and derived its name from them. This however is not the proper place for the further elucidation of this point: our present business being with the history of the Fens.