ON SOME FIXED POINTS IN BRITISH 

 ETHNOLOGY 



[1871] 



IN view of the many discussions to which the 

 complicated problems offered by the ethnology of 

 the British Islands have given rise, it may be 

 useful to attempt to pick out, from amidst the 

 confused masses of assertion and of inference, 

 those propositions which appear to rest upon a 

 secure foundation, and to state the evidence by 

 which they are supported. Such is the purpose 

 of the present paper. 



Some of these well-based propositions relate to 

 the physical characters of the people of Britain 

 and their neighbours; while others concern the 

 languages which they spoke. I shall deal, in the 

 first place, with the physical questions. 



I. Eighteen hundred years ago the population of 

 Britain comprised people of two types of complexion 



