Estay Introductory to the Archceology of the JVest of England. 131 



hovels were temporary, and their navigation carried on in canoes of osier ; 

 their habits were rude and inartificial j their knowledge of the arts trifiiugj 

 their superstition gross; their vices enormous; their virtues uncertain. Their 

 rudeness lias however been instrumental in preserving their memory, for 

 their hiding holes and encampments, their religious and sepulchral monu- 

 ments of earth and unhewn stones, remain almost unchanged ; while the 

 more elaborate structures of later and more civilized nations have fallen 

 into decay and oblivion. The lofty tower and spacious hall, the master- 

 piece of Norman skill, lie level with the soil, but the green mound which 

 witnessed their erection has survived their downfall, and remains a perpetual 

 testimony of the primaeval inhabitants of the land. 



It is inconsistent with the limits of this sketch, to enumerate even the 

 principal British kingdoms existing at the arrival of Caesar: it may however 

 be mentioned that the modern counties of Wilts, Somerset, and Gloucester, 

 formed part of the territories of the Belgse, Atrebatii, and the Dobuni, 

 uniting along the Bristol Avon ; and that Monmouth and South-Wales, the 

 ancient districts of Gwent and Dyfed, were occupied by the warlike tribes 

 of the Silures and the Demetae. 



The invasions of Caesar were of very limited extent ; he penetrated into 

 the country south of the Thames, crossed that river above Kingston, and 

 took Verulamium, the capital of Cassivelan, the chief of the confederate 

 tribes by whom he was principally opposed. After the departure of Caesar, 

 Britain remained undisturbed by the Romans for nearly a century. 



The conquest of Britain having been contemplated by Caligula, and 

 seriously undertaken by his successor Claudius, Aulus Plautius and Vespa- 

 sian were employed to reduce the nations south of the Thames, a task so 

 difficult to accomplish thoroughly that they called in the aid of Claudius 

 himself, by whom the capital of the Trinobantes, Caraalodununi, was taken, 

 and the whole of their territory, now Middlesex and Essex, reduced; Plautius 

 then resumed the command, and Claudius shewed his self-approbation, or 

 the value he set upon his conquest, by the assumption of the cognomen of 

 Brittanicus. 



As the power of the Romans in Britain increased, and their affairs there 

 assumed a more favourable prospect of its final subjugation, they erected 

 towns, and established permanent military stations, the names and places 

 of most of which have descended to us. 



About a century after tlie departure of Caesar, Ostorius Scapula, the 

 successor of Plautius as Roman governor of Britain, had thrown up lines 

 of fortification, northward along the Avon, and westward along the Severn, 

 and shortly afterwards he struck a deadly blow at the liberty, or rather the 

 licentiousness of Britain, by the defeat of its most warlike tribCj the Silures, 

 who were driven from their entrenched camp, traces of which still remain 

 upon the summits of Cacr Caradoc, and with their chief, Caractacus, ut- 

 terly routed before the superior discipline of the legions. 



