Prehistory
Main article:
Prehistoric Britain
Stonehenge, thought to have been erected c.2500-2000BC
Archaeological evidence indicates that what was later southern
Britannia was colonised by humans long before the rest of the British Isles because of its more hospitable climate between and during the various
glacial periods of the distant past. The
Sweet Track in the
Somerset Levels is the oldest
timber trackway discovered in Northern Europe and among the oldest roads in the world, and was built in 3807 or 3806 BC.
[4]
The first historical mention of the region is from the
Massaliote Periplus, a sailing manual for merchants thought to date to the 6th century BC, although cultural and trade links with the continent had existed for millennia prior to this.
Pytheas of Massilia wrote of his trading journey to the island around 325 BC.
Later writers such as
Pliny the Elder (quoting
Timaeus) and
Diodorus Siculus (probably drawing on
Poseidonius) mention the tin trade from southern Britain, but there is little further historical detail of the people who lived there.
Tacitus wrote that there was no great difference in language between the people of southern Britannia and northern
Gaul and noted that the various nations of
Britons shared physical characteristics with their continental neighbours.
Hadrian's Wall viewed from
Vercovicium
[edit] Roman Britain (Britannia)
Main article:
Roman Britain
Julius Caesar invaded southern Britain in 55 and 54 BC and wrote in
De Bello Gallico that the population of southern Britannia was extremely large and shared much in common with the
Belgae of the
Low Countries. Coin evidence and the work of later Roman historians have provided the names of some of the rulers of the disparate tribes and their machinations in what was Britannia. Until the
Roman Conquest of Britain, Britain's British population was relatively stable, and by the time of
Julius Caesar's first invasion, the
British population of what was western old Britain was speaking a
Celtic language generally thought to be the forerunner of the modern
Brythonic languages.
[5] After Julius Caesar abandoned Britain, it fell back into the hands of the Britons and the Belgae.
The Romans began their second conquest of Britain in 43 AD, during the reign of
Claudius. They annexed the whole of what would become modern England and Wales over the next forty years and periodically extended their control over much of
lowland Scotland.
[edit] Post-Roman Britain
Main article:
Sub-Roman Britain
In the wake of the breakdown of Roman rule in Britain around 410, present day England was progressively settled by
Germanic groups. Collectively known as the
Anglo-Saxons, these included
Jutes from
Jutland together with larger numbers of
Saxons from northwestern Germany and
Angles from what is now
Schleswig-Holstein.
[6] Prior to those settlements some
Frisians invaded eastern Britain in the 250s.
They first invaded Britain in the mid-5th century, continuing for several decades. The
Jutes appear to have been the principal group of settlers in
Kent, the
Isle of Wight and parts of coastal
Hampshire, while the
Saxons predominated in all other areas south of the
Thames and in
Es*** and
Middle***, and the
Angles in
Norfolk,
Suffolk, the
Midlands and the north.[
citation needed]
The population of Britain dramatically decreased after the
Roman period. The reduction seems to have been caused mainly by
plague and
smallpox. It is known that the
plague of Justinian entered the Mediterranean world in the 6th century and first arrived in the British Isles in 544 or 545, when it reached Ireland.
[7] The
Annales Cambriae mention the death of
Maelgwn Wledig, king of Gwynedd from that plague in 547.
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