CHAP, xiv.] POPULATION AT TIME OF ROMAN CONQUEST. 485 



Population at the Time of the Roman Conquest. 



The inhabitants were numerous, collected together 

 into villages and towns, and governed by chiefs 

 frequently at war with each other, who consequently 

 fell an easy prey to the Komans. They subsisted 

 principally on their swine, small short -horned cattle, 

 and horned sheep, and to a lesser degree on their crops 

 of wheat and barley. They brewed beer from both 

 of these, and used honey for making mead. The 

 tribes of northern Britain in the time of Agricola, A.D. 

 80, were pastoral and ignorant of agriculture. Under 

 the Eoman power the land rapidly passed under the 

 plough in southern and eastern Britain, and in the days 

 of Julian 1 sufficient corn was grown to freight eight 

 hundred ships, by which it was carried to- the mouth of 

 the Ehine. The corn was cut off close to the ear, or, 

 according to Pytheas, collected in sheaves, which were 

 thrashed in large buildings, 2 roofed over for protection 

 against the un genial climate. It was stored in sub- 

 terranean granaries. 



The personal appearance of the Britons of the south- 

 ern counties is described by the Eoman writers as fol- 

 lows : The hair was worn long, and sometimes the 

 beard and whiskers were shaved. The dress consisted 

 of Gaulish trousers, and a tunic with a belt, almost like 

 a Norfolk jacket, over which was worn a plaid, fastened 

 with a brooch. It varied in thickness according to the 

 season, and was of different colours, and sometimes 



1 On the authority of Zosimus (circa A.D. 500). 



2 This statement was so strange to Strabo, accustomed only to the 

 open threshing-floors of the south, that it is quoted as proving the un- 

 trustworthiness of Pytheas. Mon. Hist. Brit. xc. 



