ORIGIN OF THE BRITONS.--KELTS OF GAUL.--THE BELGÆ.--WHETHER KELTIC
OR GERMAN.--EVIDENCE OF CÆSAR.--ATTREBATES, BELGÆ, REMI, DUROTRIGES
AND MORINI, CHAUCI AND MENAPII.
Of the two branches of the Keltic stock the British will be considered
first, and that in respect to its origin.
It is rare that the population of an island is without clear, definite,
and not very distant affinities with that of the nearest part of the
nearest continent. The Cingalese of Ceylon can be traced to India; the
Sumatrans to the Malayan Peninsula; the Kurile Islanders to the
Peninsula of Sagalín; the Guanches of Teneriffe to the coast of Barbary.
The nearest approach to isolation is in the island of Madagascar, where
the affinities are with Sumatra, the Moluccas and the Malay stock rather
than with the opposite parts of Africa, the coasts of Mozambique and
Zanguibar. But Madagascar has long been the great ethnological mystery.
Iceland, too, was peopled from Scandinavia and not from Greenland.
It is in Gaul, then, that we must look for the mother-country of Kelts;
at least in the first instance, for Gaul is the nearest point--the
white cliffs of Folkstone being within sight of the opposite shore. Yet
(as an example of the extent to which one ethnological question depends
upon another) the Gallic origin of the earliest Britons has been
objected to. For a _Keltic_ population, indeed, it has been admitted to
be the natural area; but we have seen that a population other and
earlier than the Keltic has been inferred from the shape of the skulls,
and other phenomena of the Stone period. Now for such a population as
this, Jutland or Sleswick has been considered the more likely locality,
since the skulls in question have been compared to those of the
Laplanders and Finns; and, if this be true, the further north we carry
the home of the British aborigines, the less we find it necessary to
bring the Finn or Lap families southward. This reasoning is valid if the
original fact of any _pre_-Keltic population be true. Those, however,
who doubt the premises, have no need to refine upon the current notion
of Gaul being the original home of the Britons. Gaul, then, is the
ground from which we take our view of the great Keltic division of the
human species in its integrity; for, hitherto, we have seen but the
western offsets of it.
That the country between the Seine and Garonne, corresponding with the
provinces of Normandy, Brittany, Maine, Anjou, Poitiers, the Isle of
France, and the Orleannois, was Keltic, has never been doubted. The
evidence of Cæsar is express; and there is neither objection nor cavil
to set against it. There it is, where, at the present moment, the Keltic
Breton of Brittany continues to be the language of the common people.
The central and south-eastern parts of France--the Nivernois, Burgundy,
the Bourbonnois, the Lionnois, Auvergne, Dauphiny, Languedoc, Savoy, and
Provence--were _chiefly_ Keltic. Perhaps they were wholly so; but as the
Ligurians of Italy, and Iberians of Spain are expressly stated to have
met on the lower Rhone, it is best to qualify this assertion. At the
same time, good reasons can be given for considering that the Ligurians
were but little different from the other Gauls.
South of the Garonne the ancient population was _Iberic_.
Switzerland, or the ancient Helvetia, was Keltic, and beyond
Switzerland, along the banks of the Danube, and in the fertile plains of
Northern Italy, intrusive and conquering Kelts were extended as far east
as Styria, and as far south as Etruria; but these were offsets from the
main body of the stock, whose true area was Gaul and the British isles.
The parts between the Seine and Rhine, the valleys of the Marne, the
Oise, the Somme, the Sambre, the Meuse, and the Moselle were _Belgic_.
Treves was Belgian; Luxembourg, Belgian; the Netherlands, Belgian. Above
all, French Flanders, Artois, and Picardy--the parts nearest
Britain--the parts within sight of Kent--the parts from whence Britain
was most likely to be peopled--were Belgian.
Now, as Britain was originally Keltic, unless Belgium be Keltic also, we
shall meet with a difficulty.
In my own mind Belgium _was_ originally Keltic; and, perhaps, nine
ethnologists out of ten hold the same opinion. At the same time, fair
reasons can be given for an opposite doctrine, fair reasons for
believing the _Belgæ_ to have been German--as German as the Angles of
old, as German as the present Germans of Germany, as German as the Dutch
of Holland, and, what is more to the purpose, as German as the present
Flemings of Flanders, possibly occupants of the ancient, and certainly
occupants of the modern, Belgium.
Upon the latter fact we must lay considerable weight. Modern Belgium is
as truly the country of two languages and of a double population as
Wales, Ireland, or Scotland. There is the French, which has extended
itself from the south, and the Flemish, which belongs to Holland and
the parts northwards; a form of speech which differs from the true Dutch
less than the Lowland Scotch does from the English, and far less than
the Dutch itself does from the German. More than this. South of the line
which separates the French and Flemish, traces of the previous use of
the latter language are both definite and numerous, occurring chiefly in
the names of places such as _Dunkirk_, _Wissant_, &c.
Now, as the French language has encroached upon the Flemish, and the
Flemish has receded before the French, nothing is more legitimate than
the conclusion than that, at some earlier period, the dialects of the
great Germanic stock extended as far south as the Straits of Dover; and,
if so, Germans might have found their way into the south-eastern
counties of England 2000 years ago, or even sooner. Hence, instead of
the Angles and Saxons having been the first conquerors of the Britons,
and the earlier introducers of the English tongue, Belgæ of Kent, Belgæ
of Surrey, Belgæ of Sussex, and Belgæ of Hampshire, may have played an
important, though unrecorded, part in that long and obscure process
which converted Keltic Britain into German England, the land of the
Welsh and Gaels into the land of the Angles and Danes, the clansmen of
Cassibelaunus, Boadicea, Caractacus and Galgacus into the subjects of
Egbert, Athelstan, and Alfred.
Such views have not only been maintained, but they have been supported
by important testimonies and legitimate arguments. Foremost amongst the
former come two texts of Cæsar, one applying to the well-known Belgæ of
the continent, the others to certain obscurer Belgæ of Great Britain.
When Cæsar inquired of the legates of Remi, the ancient occupants, under
their ancient name, of the parts about Rheims, what States constituted
the power of the Belgæ, and what was their military power, he found
things to be as follows--"_The majority of the Belgæ were derived from
the Germans (plerosque Belgas ortos esse ab Germanus)._ Having in the
olden time crossed the Rhine, they settled in their present countries,
on account of the fruitfulness of the soil, and expelled the Gauls, who
inhabited the parts before them. They alone, with the memory of our
fathers, when all Gaul was harassed by the Teutones and Cimbri, forbid
those enemies to pass their frontier. On the strength of this they
assumed a vast authority in the affairs of war, and manifested a high
spirit. Their numbers were known, because, united by relationships and
affinities (_propinquitatibus ad finitatibusque conjuncti_), it could be
ascertained what numbers each chief could bring with him to the common
gathering for the war. The first in numbers, valour, and influence were
the Bellovaci. These could make up as many as 100,000 fighting men. Of
these they promised 40,000; for which they were to have the whole
management of the war. Their neighbours were the Suessiones, the owners
of a vast and fertile territory. Their king Divitiacus was yet
remembered as the greatest potentate of all Gaul, whose rule embraced a
part of Britain as well. Their present king was Gallus. Such was his
justice and prudence, that the whole conduct of the war was voluntarily
made over to him. Their cities were twelve in number; their contingent
50,000 soldiers. The Nervii, the fiercest and most distant of the
confederacy, would send as many; the Attrebates 15,000, the Ambiani
10,000, the Morini 22,000, the Menapii 9,000, the Caleti 10,000, the
Velocasses and Veromandui 10,000, the Aduatici 29,000; the Condrusi,
Eburones, Cærasi, and Pæmani, who were collectively called _Germans_
(_qui uno nomine Germani appellantur_) might be laid at 40,000."--Bell.
Gall., ii. 4.
Let us consider this as evidence (to a certain extent) of the north of
Gaul having been German, without, at present, asking how far it is
conclusive. If we look to Cæsar's description of Britain we shall find
the elements of a second proposition, viz., that "what is true of the
northern coast of Gaul, is true of the southern coast of Britain."[5]
So that if the Belgæ were Germans in the time of Cæsar, the populations
of Kent, Surrey, and Sussex were German also.
Cæsar's statement is, "that the interior of Britain is inhabited by
those who are recorded to have been born in the island itself; whereas
the sea-coast is the occupancy of immigrants from the country of the
_Belgæ_, brought over for the sake of either war or plunder. All these
are called by names nearly the same as those of the States they came
from, names which they have retained in the country upon which they made
war, and in the land whereon they settled."--B. G., v. 12.
I submit that these two statements would give us unexceptionable
evidence in favour of the Belgæ being Germans, and the south-eastern
Britons being Belgæ, in case they stood with no conflicting assertions
to set against them, and no presumptions in favour of an opposite
doctrine; in which case the inference that Kent was German would be
irrefragable, and would stand thus--
The Belgæ were Germans--
The south-eastern Britons were the same class with the Belgæ--
Therefore they were Germans.
Such a syllogism, I repeat, would be in proper form, and the inference
satisfactory.
But there is a great deal to set against both: so much as to make it
extremely probable that the utmost that can be got from the first
statement is, that a part of the Belgæ, and more especially the
Condrusi, Eburones, Cærasi, and Pæmani were Germans only in the way that
the people of Guernsey and Jersey are English, _i.e._, politically but
not ethnologically; and that the second only proves that certain
national names occurred on both sides of the channel.
If we look at the numerous local, national, and individual names of the
Belgæ, we find that they agree so closely in form with those of the
undoubted Gauls, as to be wholly undistinguishable. The towns end in
-_acum_, -_briva_, -_magus_, -_dunum_, and -_durum_, and begin with
_Ver_-, _Cær_-, _Con_-, and _Tre_-, just like those of Central Gallia;
so that we have--to go no farther than the common maps--Viriovi-_acum_,
Minori-_acum_, Origi-_acum_, Turn-_acum_, Bag-_acum_, Camar-_acum_,
Nemet-_acum_, Catusi-_acum_, Gemini-_acum_, Blari-_acum_, Mederi-_acum_,
Tolbi-_acum_; Samaro-_briva_; Novio-_magus_, Moso-_magus_; Vero-_dunum_;
Marco-_durum_, Theo-_durum_; _Ver_-omandui; _Cær_-asi; _Con_-drusi;
_Tre_-viri--all Gallic compounds on Belgian ground, and all forms
either wholly foreign to any German area, or else exceedingly rare. Now
it is no objection to this remarkable and exclusive preponderance of
Gallic names in Belgian geography, to say that there is no proof of the
designations in question being native; and that, although they existed
in the language of Cæsar's informants, who were Gauls, they were
strange to the Belgæ, even as the word _Welsh_ is strange to a
Cambro-Briton--being the name by which he is known to an Englishman, but
not the true and native denomination. I say that all argument of this
kind, valid as it is in so many other cases where it is never applied,
has no place here; since Cæsar's informants about the Belgic populations
were the Belgæ themselves, and it is inconceivable that they should have
used nothing but Gallic terms when they spoke of themselves, if they had
not been Gauls.
The names of the individual Belgic chiefs are as Gallic as those of the
towns and nations, _e.g._, _Commius_ and _Divitiacus_, and so are those
of such Britons as _Cassibelaunus_.
I submit that this is, as far as it goes, a reason for limiting rather
than extending all such statements as the ones in question. And it is by
no means a solitary one. A statement of Strabo confirms it:--"The
Aquitanians are wholly different" (_i.e._, from the other Gauls) "not
only in language, but in their bodies,--wherein they are more like the
Iberians than the Gauls. The rest are Gallic in look; but not all alike
in language. Some differ _a little_. Their politics, too, and manners of
life differ _a little_."--Lib. iv. c. 1.
With the external evidence, then, of Strabo, coinciding with the
internal evidence derived from the geographical, national, and
individual names, it seems illegitimate to infer from the text of Cæsar
more than has been suggested.
Unless we believe the Belgæ of Picardy to have been Germans, the second
fact stated by Cæsar, viz., the Belgic origin of the south-eastern
Britons is comparatively unimportant, since it merely shews that between
the Britons of the south-eastern coast, and those of the interior, there
were certain points of difference, the former being recent immigrants,
and Belgium being the country from which they migrated. Nevertheless,
this introduces a difficulty; since, by drawing a distinction between
the men of Kent, and the men of the Midland Counties, we are precluded
from arguing that the Britons in general belonged to the same class as
the Gauls; inasmuch as Cæsar's description may fairly be said to apply
to the _Belgic Britons only_.
I think, myself, that Cæsar's statement must be taken as an _inference_
rather than as _evidence_; in other words, he must not be considered to
say that certain _Attrebates_ and _Belgæ_ crossed the Straits of Dover
and settled in Britain, but that, as certain portions both of Belgium
and Britain bore the same names, a migration had taken place; such being
the explanation of the coincidence. Or, if we suppose Cæsar himself to
have been too acute a reasoner to confound a conclusion with a fact (as,
perhaps, he was), we may attribute the inference to his informants.
Whoever is in the habit of sifting ethnological evidence, is well aware
that a confusion of kind in question is one of the commonest of the
difficulties he must deal with.
At the same time, that there were some actual Belgæ in Britain is likely
enough; but that they were a separate substantive population, of
sufficient magnitude to be found in all the parts of Britain where
Belgic names occurred, and still more that they were Germans, is an
unsafe inference; safe, perhaps, if the two texts of Cæsar stood alone,
but unsafe, if we take into consideration the numerous facts,
statements, and presumptions which complicate and oppose them.
The Belgic names themselves, which occurred in Britain, were as
follows:--
_a._ _Attrebates._--There were Attrebates both in Belgium and Britain;
the Gaelic ones in _Artois_, which is only _Attrebates_ in a modern
form. Considerable importance attaches to the fact, that before Cæsar
visited Britain in person, he sent _Commius_, the Attrebatian, before
him. Now, this Commius was first conquered by Cæsar, and afterwards set
up as a king over the Morini. That Commius gave much of his information
about Britain to Cæsar is likely; perhaps he was his chief informant.
He, too, it was who, knowing the existence of Attrebates in Britain,
probably drew the inference which has been so lately suggested, viz.,
that of a Belgæ migration, or a series of them. Yet the Attrebates of
Britain were so far from being on the coast, that they must have lain
west of London, in Berkshire and Wilts; since Cæsar, who advanced, at
least, as far as Chertsey, where he crossed the Thames, meets nothing
but Cantii, Trinobantes, Cenimagni, Segontiaci, Ancalites, Bibroci and
Cassi. It is Ptolemy who first mentions the British _Attrebatii_; and he
places them between the Dobuni and the Cantii. Now, as the Dobuni lay
due west of the Silures of South Wales, we cannot bring the Attrebatii
nearer the coast than Windsor.
_b._ The _Belgæ_.--These--like the Attrebatii, first mentioned by
Ptolemy--are placed south of the Dobuni, and on the sea-coast between
the Cantii and Damnonii of Devonshire; so that Sussex, Hants, and
Dorset, may be given them as their area.
_c._ The _Remi_ are mentioned by no better an authority than Richard of
Cirencester, as Bibroci under another name.
_d._ The _Durotriges_, too, or people of _Dor_-set, are stated by the
same authority to have been called _Morini_.
_e._ _f._ In Ireland we have two populations with German names; the
_Menapii_ and the _Chauci_, both in the parts about Dublin, and in the
neighbourhood of one another. And these are mentioned by Ptolemy.
Now, whatever these Belgic names prove, they do not prove Cæsar's
statement that it was the _maritime parts of Britain which were Belgic_;
since the Menapii and Chauci must have been wholly unknown to him, and
the _Attrebatii_ lay inland.
At the same time, they prove something. They also introduce difficulties
in the very simple view that Britain was solely and exclusively British.
This leads to a further consideration of the details. The _Remi_ may be
disposed of first. They stand on bad authority, viz., that of a monk of
the twelfth century.
So may the _Morini_. Though I admit the ingenuity and soundness of the
doctrine that the existence of a double nomenclature such as that by
which the Durotriges are called Morini, and the Morini, Durotriges, is
well explained by the assumption of a second language, and the notion
that the inhabitants of certain districts were sometimes called by a
British, sometimes by a German, name, the hypothesis is not valid where
the facts can be more easily explained otherwise. No one would thus
explain such words as _Lowlander_ and _Borderer_ applied to the people
of the Cheviot Hills. Yet both are current; one being given when their
relation to England, the other when their difference from the Highland
Gaels, is expressed.
Now, it so happens that _Morini_ and _Durotriges_ are words that can as
little be considered as synonymous terms belonging to different
languages as _Lowlander_ and _Borderer_; since good reasons can be given
for referring them _both_ to the Keltic. Their _exact_ import is
difficult to ascertain; but if we suppose them to mean _coasters_ and
_watersidemen_, respectively, we get a clear view of the unlikelihood of
one being German and the other Keltic. Thus--
_Duro-triges_ coincides with the Latin compound _ponticolæ_, since _dwr_
in Welsh, Cornish, and Armorican means _water_, and _trigau_ means _to
remain_ or _to inhabit_; _trig-adiad_ denoting _dwellers_, or
inhabitants, as is well remarked by Prichard, v. iii. 128.
_Môr_, in _Morini_, is neither more nor less than the Latin word
_mare_.[6] Surely this sets aside all arguments drawn from the supposed
bilingual character of the words _Morini_ and _Durotriges_.
The _Cauci_ and _Menapii_ of Ireland tell a different tale. One name
without the other would prove but little; but when we find _Cauci_ in
Germany not far from _Menapii_, and _Menapii_ in Ireland not far from
_Chauci_, the case becomes strengthened. Yet the likelihood of _Menap_,
being the same word as the _Menai_ of the _Menai Straits_ in Wales,
suggests the probability of that word being a geographical term.
Nevertheless, the contiguity of the two nations is an argument as far as
it goes.
And here I must remark, that the process by which words originally very
different may become identified when they pass into a fresh language is
not sufficiently attended to. _Cauci_ is the form which an Irish,
_Chauci_ that which a German, word takes in Latin. And the two words are
alike. Yet it is far from certain that they would be thus similar if we
knew either the Gaelic original of one, or the German of the other. A
dozen forms exceedingly different might be excogitated, which, provided
that they all agreed in being strange to a Roman, would, when moulded
into a Latin form, become alike. Still the argument, as far as it goes,
is valid.
Such are the reasons for believing, at one and the same time, that the
Britons came from Belgic Gaul, and that the Belgæ from whence they came
were Kelts.
We cannot, however, so far consider the origin of the British branch of
the Keltic stock to be disposed of, as to proceed forthwith to the
Gaelic; another population requires a previous notice. This is the
Pict.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] These are the exact words of one of the ablest supporters of the
Germanic origin of the south-eastern Britons, Mr. E. Adams, in a paper
entitled, "Remarks on the probability of Gothic Settlements in Britain
Previously to A.D. 450."--_Philological Transactions_, No. ciii.
[6] This root is important. As it means _sea_ in more European languages
than one, it has created a philological difficulty in the case of a very
interesting gloss, _Mori-marusa_, meaning _dead sea_; where by a strange
coincidence the same consonants (_m-r_) are repeated, but with a
difference of meaning.
Prichard, who drew attention to this remarkable compound, having stated
that a passage in Pliny informed us that the _Cimbri_ called the sea in
their neighbourhood _Mori-marusa_, inferred that the name was Cimbric;
and further argued, that as _mor mawth_ in Welsh meant the same, the
Cimbric tongue was Welsh, Cambrian, or British. As far as it went the
inference was truly legitimate; but the reasoning which led to it was
deficient. The likelihood of there being more languages than one wherein
both _mor_ meant _sea_, and _mor_ meant _dead_, was overlooked; though
one of the languages that supplied the coincidence was the Latin--_mare
mort-uum_.
Another such a tongue was the Slavonic; and to that tongue I imagine
_Morimarusa_ to be referrible. I also imagine that by the _Cimbri_ of
Pliny were meant the _Cimmerii_; so that the Sea of Azof was the true
Dead Sea; or, perhaps, the Propontis; in which case its present name,
the _Sea of Marmora_, is explained.
The name of the Province, _Ar-mor-ica_, means the _country on the sea_,
and if rendered in Latin would be _ad mare_. _Ar-gail_ is such another
word; and it was the name of the landing-place of the _Gael_=_ad
Gallos_.
To the Gaelic _Ar-mor-ica_, the Slavonians have an exact parallel in the
word _Po-mor-ania_; where _po_ means _on_, and _mor_ the _sea_.