CHAP, ix.] IBERIC AND CELTIC PEOPLES IN BRITAIN. 



this respect, then, the historical narrative agrees with 

 the conclusions at which we have arrived from the dis- 

 tribution of the human remains over the Continent. The 

 relative antiquity also of the two races in Europe is 

 settled. The Iberians were the possessors of the land 

 from which they were ultimately driven by the invasion 

 of the Celtic peoples farther and farther to the south- 

 west into those fastnesses in which they were compelled 

 to make a stand by the waters of the ocean. 



Iberic Race the Older. 



This invasion of the regions west of the Ehine took 

 place, as we have seen, in the Neolithic age, and long 

 before the dawn of history in those regions. In the days 

 of Caesar the Belgse possessed the country from the Seine 

 and Marne as far north as the Scheldt, and pressed upon 

 the Celtse, with whom they were probably closely related 

 in language and physique. They were in their turn 

 pushed to the west by the advance of the Germans in 

 the Ehine provinces. Thus we have the oldest popula- 

 tion, or the Iberian, in the western parts of France and 

 Spain, being pushed farther and farther westward by 

 the Celts ; the Celts in their turn by the Belgae ; and 

 these again by the Germanic tribes. The Neolithic 

 aborigines are in the west; and the relative positions 

 (Fig. 112) of the three peoples mark their relative anti- 

 quity in Europe. 



Historic Evidence as to Iberic and Celtic Peoples 

 in Britain. 



An appeal to the ancient history of Britain reveals 

 the same elements in the population in the same relative 



Y 



