Mr. White of Newgate-street has a gold British coin, found in an urn in Oxfordshire, together with a gold ring set with a pearl.
When Cæsar returned, he found letters to him, acquainting him with his daughter Julia’s death. Plutarch.
I shall conclude with this observation, that on Cæsar’s return to the continent, the Morini, inhabiting the opposite shore, lay in wait for his men, hoping to obtain great spoils. This was in his first expedition: it shows Britain was not so despicable a country as authors generally make it: much more might they have expected it in return from his second expedition, when the nations of the Cattichlani, Bibroci, Ancalites, Trinobantes, Cenimani, Segontiaci, sent ambassadors to him, seeking his favour; all charged with magnificent gifts: and, beyond doubt, the Londoners were not slack, for so great a favour as protecting them from the insults of Casvelhan, and restoring to them their king Mandubrace.
Cæsar, having accomplished his purposes here, returned by Smallbury green, in order to pass the Thames again at Chertsey. Smallbury green was then an open place as now, and has its name from his prætorium, like this at the Brill: the road lately went round it on the north side; and gravel had long been dug from it, to mend the road; yet I could discern part of it, till, three years ago, they made a new road across the green, and totally ruined the prætorium. There is a spring arises at the place.
It is fit we should say somewhat of the city of London, the glory of Britain. Cæsar calls the inhabitants of this country Trinobantes: it comprehends Middlesex and Essex on this side the river; Surry on the other. The name of Trinobantes is derived from Trinobantum, the most ancient name of London: it signifies the city of the Novii, or Novantes, the original name of the people called Trinobantes by Cæsar. Tri, or Tre, in the very old British dialect, imports a fortified city. Many names of this kind still remain, in Cornwall especially.
Noviomagus most certainly is Croydon in Surry. Magus in British signifies a city on a down, or heath. Newington on the South of London, and Newington on the north, retain evident remains of the name of the Novantes.
In many coins of the great king Cunobeline, nephew of our prince Mandubrace, we have inscribed TASCIO NOVANTVM, meaning the tribute of the Londoners, and of the people Novantes, dependent on them, called by Cæsar Trinobantes.
The Novii, or Novantes, the original people of this country, knew how to take the proper advantage of the noble river Thames, and built this their fortified city of Trinobantum upon a most convenient situation, celebrated by all writers. The inhabitants of this potent city carried on a very considerable trade with the continent, and were rich and flourishing, as those numerous coins of Cunobeline are evidences beyond all exception. Londinium copia negotiatorum & commeatuum maxime celebre, says Tacitus. These coins are in gold, silver, copper: I have engraved twenty-three plates of them. Nor, in my opinion, have we reason to doubt of Billings-gate being built by him, as his royal custom-house; and why Ludgate should not take name from Immanuence Lud, father of our prince Mandubrace, I see not. The business of a society of antiquaries is to separate truth from fable, by evidence, by reason, and judgement. Authors are certainly mistaken in thinking our British ancestors a rude and barbarous people. Need we a further testimony of our continental trade, Cæsar speaks of the Gaulish merchants who traded hither: he convened them together to inquire concerning the nature of the country; and I have the strongest reasons in the world to induce me to believe, that Britain was peopled before the opposite continent, by a great and polite nation; and that our British coins are the oldest of any in Europe.
Cunobeline, very young, was carried to Rome by his uncle Mandubrace, four years after Cæsar’s expedition here, and his restitution to the kingdom of the Trinobantes. Cunobeline became well acquainted, and even intimate with Augustus, in the dawning of his power; being about the same age. Augustus entertained a great kindness for him; and he bore a share in his warfare, being præfect of a Roman legion, the XX. VV. called Cretica, as Richard of Cirencester informs us; which is the reason that he so often struck the figure of a boar on his British coins, that being the ensign and cognisance of the legion. After he returned, and was king of Britain, he kept up a friendship and correspondence with Augustus, during his whole, and that a very long life. He struck many coins in honour of Augustus, and the plainest imitations of the coins of Augustus. He sent him magnificent presents, paid a tribute to him, built the city Cæsaromagus in compliment to him. He celebrated the Actiac games like those done by Agrippa at Rome, by Herod at Cæsarea, and many other states of the Roman empire. By these means he staved off, for his life, an actual subjection of Britain to the Romans.
I cannot agree with my late learned friend Mr. Baxter in his derivation of Trinobantum, that it is of Belgic original. The word Tri or Tre of the old Cornish, prefixed, sufficiently confutes the notion: here is none of the Belgic pronunciation, as in the west of England. Cæsar’s assertion of the supereminent power of the Trinobantes, shows they were an aboriginal people: they had indeed been under some sort of subjection to the Cassii, or Cattichleuni; but that may have been recent, when Casvelhan invaded them, and slew their king, his brother Immanuence, father to our Mandubrace, as Cæsar tells us.