The Aborigines.
NORWICH is very remarkable for its antiquities, its historical
associations, its manufactures, and its trade; and also for the eminent
men who have flourished at various periods in the city. It was the scene
of many important events in the times of the Iceni, the Romans, the
Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Danes, and Normans. It was the royal seat of
Anglo-Saxon princes. It was the Hierapolis Monachopolis of the middle
ages; famous for its churches and convents; and in later times,
celebrated for its Norman castle and cathedral.
The first foundations of history are very often mere traditions, which
are transmitted from parents to their children, from one generation to
another. Probable only in their origin, they become less probable in
every succeeding age. In process of time fable gains and truth loses
ground. Hence it is almost impossible to ascertain the origin of any
place claiming a high antiquity. The early writers could not divest
their minds of the fascinating fables of Geoffrey of Monmouth. In former
times, when the power of imagination prevailed, the distinction between
legend and history was scarcely recognised. For centuries there are not
even legendary accounts of East Anglia or of its capital. But instead of
legends, there are permanent memorials of the past; great earthworks,
fortifications, camps, strongholds, buildings, churches, ruins of
monasteries and abbeys. The soil has yielded up relics of the
dead—weapons, utensils, coins, ornaments, and sepulchral urns, showing
the presence of the Iceni, the Romans, the Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Danes,
and Normans, at different periods. All these energetic nations were
concerned in events that took place in Norfolk and Norwich.
The Iceni appear to have been politically independent up to the period of
the Roman invasion, B.C. 55. Their alarm in consequence of that invasion
led them to negociate an alliance, but we have no reason to suppose that
it was ever carried into effect. They took the lead in a rebellion which
the Roman General Ostorius was barely able to quell; and Roman historians
bear testimony to the valour with which they struggled to maintain their
liberty. The superior discipline of the Roman soldiers enabled them,
however, to triumph over a semi-barbarous people, unprotected by body
armour and unused to military tactics; but it was no easy victory. For
about 600 years after the defeat of the Iceni, no reliable information
respecting that people is to be found in any history. Indeed they
disappear from history altogether, and we can only infer what advances
they made in civilization from the scattered remains that have been found
in the eastern counties. These remains prove that the Iceni were not
semi-savages, but that they had made some progress in useful arts, that
they built houses, and wore woven garments.
There are no remains in the eastern counties of cairns, cromlechs,
Druidical circles, or other memorials of ancient perseverance and
mechanical skill, nature having interposed an absolute veto. But there
are remains of earth works and tumuli, burrows or artificial mounds in
which were deposited the urns or ashes of the dead. There are thousands
of pits in many places, and these are supposed to have been the
foundations of Icenian houses. Remarkable excavations are thickly
clustered all over Weybourne Heath, varying from 8 to 20 feet in
diameter, and from 2 to 6 feet in depth.
The Norwich Museum contains some remains of articles made by the Iceni,
amongst which may be mentioned sepulchral urns, varying from the most
primitive simplicity, up to forms and patterns worthy of any age. The
_chevron_ ornament, which is by far the most usual style of decoration,
has been traced not merely in India, Egypt, Etruria, and Nineveh, as well
as in Saxon and Norman work, but even among the works of ancient American
settlers in Yucatan! The Museum also contains specimens of Icenic Celts
or javelin heads, made of flints, which appear to have been originally
fitted on a wooden shaft or handle, with a provision for drawing it back
after the infliction of the wound, by means of a cord passing through the
ring, as in the metal specimens. It is probable that these flint
specimens were in use long anterior to the Roman invasion.
About 1844 or 1845, some discoveries were made in Norfolk of gold torques
and coins of the Iceni. In March 1855, at Weston in Norfolk, 300 coins
of the Iceni were found. The most ordinary type is the rude
representation of a horse on each side; others have two crescents placed
back to back; and on some (in about the proportion of one in twenty,) is
a rude profile of a human head, while in a few instances there is a
figure of a wild boar. Beneath the horse in some cases are the letters E
C E or E C N, (supposed to be a contraction of Iceni,) also C E A, T, A T
D, A T E D, or A N T D, which antiquarians are as yet unable to explain.
Probably all the coins, like a single coin which has been found of
Boadicea, the unfortunate Queen of the Iceni, were subsequent to the
Roman invasion, for Cæsar expressly tells us that the Britons in his time
used metal rings instead of money, the value being determined by their
weight; and Camden, with great probability, supposes that most of the
British coins must have been struck as a sort of poll tax or tribute
money to the Romans.
Generally speaking, the antiquities of the British period are articles of
the most urgent necessity, and of the rudest possible form; but a long
interval of tranquillity brought even luxuries in its train, and it is a
very remarkable fact that even the lapse of 1800 years has scarcely
effected any change in some articles of general utility. The discoveries
made at Herculaneum and Pompeii have led to a revival of the classical
forms, both in porcelain and in plate, the greatest practical compliment
that could be paid to the taste of the Roman artists.
Among the objects which have been found at different places may be
mentioned sepulchral vases, varying, of course, in style and taste, but
in some instances most beautifully formed; funeral lamps, lacrymatories,
(or phials supposed to have contained the tears of the sorrowing
relations,) _fibulæ_ (or brooches), gold rings, gold seals, steelyards,
weights, tweezers, a curiously formed brass lamp for three lights, a
patera of Samian ware, and coins of the Roman emperors. All these may be
seen in the Norwich Museum.
There is no evidence of the existence of Norwich as a city for 400 years
after the Christian era. The whole island was a howling wilderness, and
Norfolk was a vast common, like Roudham Heath. The natives lived by
hunting or fishing, and sheltered themselves in the woods, or in caves,
or huts. Water covered nearly all the area in which the city is now
built, and filled all the valley of the Yare. The aborigines, called the
Iceni, probably lived in huts near the banks of the river, as it afforded
a good supply of fish; but there is no proof that they lived in any place
that could be called a town or even a village. There is in fact, no
reliable account whatever of the natives, how they lived, or where they
lived in this district; for they have not even left any names of places,
and very few traces of any progress in the useful arts, and certainly
none of any buildings. On Mousehold Heath, near the city, and at various
places in the county, there are hollows supposed to have been made by the
Iceni as the foundation of huts, or of houses of wicker work, or some
other perishable material, with a conical thatching at the top.
Externally they must have looked like very low bastions, having doorways,
but apparently neither chimneys nor windows.