BRITAIN

From Agepedia

BRITAIN, according to Aristotle, was the name which the Romans gave to modern England and Scotland. This appellation is, perhaps, derived from the old word brit, partycolored, it having been customary with the inhabitants to paint their bodies with various colors. According to the testimony of Pliny and Aristotle, the island, in the remotest times, also bore the name of Albion, (q. v.) The sea, by which B. is surrounded, was generally called the Western, the Atlantic, or the Hesperian ocean. Until the time of Caesar, B. was totally unknown to the Romans. But the Phoenicians, Greeks and Carthaginians, especially the first, were acquainted with it from the earliest period, being accustomed to obtain tin there. On this account, they called it Tin island, as Herodotus informs us. Caesar undertook two expeditions to B. He defeated the inhabitants, whom he found entirely savage, and continued a short time on the island. It was not, however, until the time of Claudius, that the Romans gained a firm footing there. At that period, they extended their possessions in the country, and called the territory under their dominion Britannia Romana. The most important acquisitions were afterwards made under Adrian and Constantine. At last, the inhabitants assumed the manners of their conquerors. The country was very populous in the time of Caesar, and, according to the testimony of Tacitus, fertile. It was divided into Britannia Romana and B. Barbara. The Romans, from the time of Adrian, anxiously endeavored to secure the former against the invasions of the barbarians, by a wall or rampart of earth fortified with turrets and bulwarks. Lollius T/rbicus, in the reign of Antoninus, extended this wall; but Septimius Severus restored its former limits. In his time, the Roman province was divided into the eastern {p?ima, or inferior) and the western part {secunda, or superior). Two provinces were added by Constantine. The inhabitants of ancient B. derived their origin partly from an original colony of Celtse, partly from a mixed body of Gauls and Germans. The Celtic colonists, or the Britons, properly so called, living in the interior of the country, had less intercourse with foreign merchants than the Gauls, who lived along the coasts. They are therefore represented by the Romans as less civilized. The Gallic inhabitants, who had settled nearer the seacoast, possessed some property, and were therefore more easily intimidated than those tribes that were dispersed through the forests. None of them cultivated the ground: they all lived by raising cattle and hunting. Their dress consisted of skins. Their habitations were huts made of wickerwork and covered with rushes. Their priests, the Druids, together with the sacred women, exercised a kind of authority over them. (For the modern kingdom of Great Britain, see Gi^eat Britain.)