ANTIQUITIES. 
taken poffeffion of about the fame 
time; but the laft clames the honor 
of being of a far earlier date, more 
opulent, populous, and a royal feat 
before the conqueft of Britain. Ca- 
amalodunum was made a Colonia, er 
a place governed entirely by Ro- 
man laws and cuftoms; Vervla- 
~mium, a Municipium, in which the 
natives were honored with the pri- 
vileges of Roman citizens, and en- 
joyed their own laws and contti- 
tutions; and Londinum only a Pre- 
fe€tura, the inhabitants, a mixture 
of Romans and Britons, being fuf- 
fered to enjoy no more than the 
name of citizens of Rome, being go- 
verned by prefects fent annually 
from thence, without having either 
their own Jaws or magiftrates. It was 
even then of fuch concourfe, and 
fuch vaft trade, that the wife con- 
querors did not think fit to truft the 
inhabitants with the fame privileges 
as other places, of which they had 
lefs reafon to be jealous. 
‘There is no mention of this im- 
portant place, till the reign of 
Nero; when ‘[acitus fpeaks of it 
as not having been diftinguifhed 
as a colony, but famous for its great 
_ concourfe of merchants, and its vaft 
commerce: this indicates, at left, 
» that London had been at that time 
of fome antiquity as a trading 
town, and founded long before the 
reign of that emperor. The ex- 
ports from hence were cattle, hides, 
_ and corn; dogs made a {mall arti- 
cle; and, Jet me add, that flaves 
were a confiderable object. Our 
internal parts were on a level with 
the African flave coaits; and wars 
among the petty monarchs were 
promoted for the fake of a traffic 
now fo ftrongly controverted. The 
‘imports were at firft falt, earthen 
ware, and works in brafs, polifhed 
_the Tower. 
103 
bits of bones emulating ivory, 
horfe-collars, toys of amber, and 
glaffes, and other articles of the 
fame material. We need not infitt 
on the commerce of this period, 
for there was a great trede carried 
on with the Gauls in the days of 
Cefar: that celebrated invader af- 
figning, as his reafon for attempt- 
ing this ifland, the vaft fupplies 
which we gave to his Gaulifh ene- 
mics, and which interrupted his con- 
quefts on the continent. 
When the Romans became maf- 
ters of Lendon, they enlarged the 
precinéts, and altered their form. 
It extended in length from Lud- 
gate-hill to a fpot a little beyond 
The breadth was not 
half equal to the length, and at 
each end grew confiderably nar- 
rower. ‘The time in which the wall 
was built is very uncertain. Some 
afcribe the work to Conftantine the 
great. Maitland, to Theodofius, 
governor of Britain in 369. Pof- 
fibly their founder might have been 
Conftantine, as numbers of coins of 
his mother Helena have been dif. - 
covered under them, placed there 
by him in compliment to her. To 
fupport this conjecture, we may 
ftrengthen it by faying, that in ho- 
nor of this emprefs, the city, about 
that time, received from her the 
tilte of Augufta; which, for fome 
time, fuperfeded the antient one of 
Londinium. Long before this pe- 
riod, it was fully Romanized, and 
the cuftoms, manners, buildings, and 
arts of the conqueror adopted. The 
commerce of the empire flowed in 
regularly; came in a direét channel 
from the feveral parts then known, 
not as in the earlier days (when 
defcribed by Strabo) by the inter- 
vention of other nations; for till 
the fettlement of the Roman con- 
H 4 quel, 
