þære stowe pe is gecueden Pórtesmuða [ and sona land namon] and [þær] ofslogon anne giongne Brettisc monnan, swide ædelne monuan.

a place which is called Portsmouth, [and they soon landed,] and they [there] slew a young British man, a very noble man.

Now Portus must have been the name of Portsmouth, long anterior to A.D. 501, inasmuch as it was a Latin, and not an Angle, word; whilst the landing of a man named Port at a place already called Portus is improbable. Just, however, as one Port hits upon a spot with a name like his own, one Wihtgar does the same.

A.D. 530.-Her Cerdic and Cynric genamon Wihte Ealand, and ofslogon feåla men on Wiht-garas-byrg.

A.D. 534.-Her Cerdic [se forma West-Sexana cyng ] forðferðe, and Cynric his suna [feng to rice, ánd] ricsode forð xxvi wintra, and hie saldon hiera tuæm nefum Stufe and Wiht-gare [eall] WihtEalond.

A.D. 544.-Her Wihtgar fordferde, and hiene mon bebyrgde on Wiht-gara-burg.

A. D. 530. This year Cerdic and Cynric took the island of Wight, and slew many men at Wiht-garas-byrg.

A.D. 534.-This year Cerdic [the first king of the West-Saxons,] died, and Cyndric, his son, [took to the kingdom,] and reigned from that time twenty-six winters; and they gave the [whole] island of Wihl to their two nephews, Stuf and Wiht-gar.

A. D. 544. This year Wihtgar died, and they buried him in Wiht-gara-byrg.

Now Wiht is the Anglo-Saxon form of the name of Vectis Isle of Wight, a name found in the Latin writers long anterior to A.D. 530; and gar is a form of the word ware (or wæras)=inhabitants. Yet the Anglo

Saxon Chronicle makes it a man's name.

The following instances, less decided than the previous ones, are, nevertheless, worth noticing.

A.D. 477. Her cóm Ella to Bretten-lond and his iii suna, Cymen, and Wlencing, and Cissa, mid iii scipum, on pa stowe þe is nemned Cymenesora, and þær of slogon monige Walas, and sume on fleame bedrifon on þone widu pe is genemned Andredes-leage.

A.D. 477.-This year Ella, and his three sons Cymen, and Wlencing, and Cissa, came to the land of Britain with three ships, at a place which is named Cymenes-ora, and there slew many Welsh, and some they drove in flight into the wood that is named Andredslea.

These names are the names of geographical localities, Lancing, Keynsor (Cymenesora) and Chichester (Cissanceaster); which is suspicious: becoming more so when we find that the second element in Cissan-ceaster (if not in Cymenes-ora also) is Latin.

§ 14. However, it is not a history of Great Britain that I am writing, but one of the English language. Hence the whole question as to the literary and historical value of the early writers is too wide. The extent to which they are sufficient or insufficient to prove certain specific facts

is all that need be investigated. One of these is the date of A.D. 449, for the first landing of the first ancestors of the present English. That certain Germans

coast of Kent is the

be

settled on a certain part of the simple, straightforward part of it. That they were the first who did so is quite a different matter: and it should be recognized as such. To date the German occupancy from A.D. 449, and (holding that it began with the exploits of Hengest and Horsa) to maintain that no Angle had landed upon any part of England before, is to lay too little stress upon the Notitia, and too much upon Beda. To do so is not only to attempt the notoriously difficult proof of a negative, but it is to attempt it in the face of conflicting evidence. That such conflicting evidence may objected to I, by no means, deny. The settlements on the Saxon shore may have been ephemeral. The authorities of Beda may have had better opportunities of knowing the archæology of their respective districts than we suppose. Beda himself may have exercised a judicious criticism. The more, however, I attend to Beda's narrative, the fewer reasons I find for allowing his text to be final and conclusive. It is, indeed, not unlikely that the authority of, even, Albinus, Daniel, and others has been claimed in behalf of statements which have no such grounds to rest on. That a notice like that of the death of

Horsa may have been found on Kentish soil (though the localities which, at the present moment, bear the names of Hengistbury and Horsted are in Hampshire and Sussex) is probable enough. So-allowing for the difference of locality-may other local stories. What, however, is the basis for the general statements as to the nationality of Hengest, the difference between the Jutes and the Saxons, the Saxons and the Angles, and the like? Not that of Beda himself? Not, always, that of Beda's informants? Strictly speaking it is only for the Ecclesiastical history of the times subsequent to the conversion of Ethelbert that any of the authorities above-mentioned are referred to. For the times anterior to the introduction of Christianity and the foundation of the See of Canterbury the reference is to the old writers in general.

Translation.

From the beginning of this volume to the time when the nation of the Angles received the religion of Christ, I have learned what I lay before you from the writings of those who have gone before me, as I have collected them from this quarter or that. From that time, however, to the

A principio itaque voluminis hujus usque ad tempus quo gens Anglorum fidem Christi percepit, ex priorum maxime scriptis, hic inde collectis ea quæ promeremus didicimus. Exinde autem, &c.

The continuation has already been given. It tells us for what he consulted Albinus-for what Nothelm-for what Daniel &c.

Of the priorum scripta one was the Liber Querulus de Excidio Britanniæ of Gildas, a scholar of St. Iltutus, and a monk of Bangor, who died and was buried at Glastonbury. He states that he was born in the year of the battle of the Mons Badonicus, which no investigator makes earlier than A.D. 493, and which some bring down to A.D. 516.

Let Gildas have written as early as A.D. 540, let him

C

have been the brightest luminary of the British Church; and let the literary culture which attended the early Christianity of our island have been ever so high, we still find that, even for ordinary history, his opportunities whether of time or place, are utterly insufficient to make his statements conclusive.

Mutatis mutandis, this applies to Beda. Add to Gildas a life of St. Germanus and some few classical writers, and we have the authorities for the Historia Ecclesiastica. Whatever may have been the learning of the author, and however much he may have been the luminary of his age, his materials are neither better nor worse than this. Indeed, it is only for Northumberland that Beda is, himself, answerable. The real evidence is that of Albinus, Daniel, the monks of Lestingham, &c.

A measure of the value of their evidence is to be found in their account of the Roman Wall. Gildas says it was built against the Scots and Picts, and that its date was the fifth century; and Beda follows him. The inaccuracy of this statement is well known. What warrant have we that it is the only inaccuracy in the works in which it occurs?

CHAPTER III.

GERMAN ORIGIN OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.-PARTS FROM WHICH IT WAS INTRODUCED.-METHOD OF TREATING THE SUBJECT.-EXTERNAL EVIDENCE.-WRITERS SUBSEQUENT TO THE ANGLE CONQUEST.

§ 15. THE first introduction of a German population on the soil of Britain is one thing: the evacuation of the island by the Romans another. This latter event may safely be referred to the middle of the fifth century, say

A.D. 446. By fixing on a particular year we get precision: the reason why this one in particular is chosen being as follows:-It was the year of the third Consulship of Ætius; and to Ætius, according to Gildas, the following letter was addressed.

Translation.

To Etius, thrice Consul, the groans of the Britons. The Barbarians drive us to the sea. The sea drives us back to the Barbarians. Between these arise two sorts of death. We are either slaughtered or drowned.

In the original.

Agitio, ter Consul, gemitus Britannorum. Repellunt nos Barbari ad mare, repellit nos mare ad Barbaros; inter hæc oriuntur duo genera fu. nerum: aut jugulamur, aut mergimur.-Historia Gildæ, xvii.

But the whole century was an age of darkness, confusion, and barbarism: and so was the century which followed. For accurate narrative, careful chronology, and authentic geography, the investigator looks in vain. Nevertheless his investigations are practicable. Certain approximate results may be obtained-certain approximate results, if nothing better.

§ 16. There are no notices of Britain of the exact date of the Angle invasions. Neither are there any such notices of the Angle part of Germany in the days when the Angles conquered England. But there is something of the sort. There are sketches (to say the least of them) of both countries for certain times anterior to the Angle epoch; and there is something better than sketches for the times that follow it.

In these we have the testimony of certain writers; testimony which constitutes our external evidence. How it is to be used will be considered as we proceed. At present, it is enough if due attention be given to the word external.

In contrast to this, under the general title of internal