FRISIAN COLONY. 36l 



one body, but successively, in the course of many years : 

 they spread themselves over various parts of the coasts 

 of the North Sea, and even a considerable way up the 

 borders of the Weser and the Elbe ; according to do- 

 cuments which I have mentioned in my Letters sur THis- 

 toire de la Terre et de THomme. These new settlers 

 found large marsches, formed, as well in the wide mouths 

 of those rivers as along the coasts, and around the origi- 

 nal islands of geest ; especially that of Heiligeland, the 

 most distant from the coast, and opposite the mouth of 

 the Eyder. Of this island, which is steep towards the 

 south, the original mass consists of strata of sandstone ; 

 and at that time its marsch extended almost to Eyder- 

 stede : there were marsches likewise around all the other 

 original islands; besides very large islands of pure marsch 

 in the intervals of the former. 



All these lands were desert at the arrival of the Fri- 

 sians ; and the parts on which they established their first 

 habitations, to take care of their breeds of horses and 

 cattle feeding on the marsches, were the original emi- 

 nences of the islands ; on that of Heiligeland they built 

 a temple to their great goddess Phoseta, or Fosta. 

 When they became too numerous to confine themselves 

 to the heights, their herds being also greatly multipli- 

 ed, they ventured to begin inhabiting the marsches ; but 

 afterwards, some great inundations having shewn them 

 the dangers of that situation, they adopted the practice 

 followed by those who had settled on the marsches of the 

 province of Groningen, and still continued on the Hal- 

 ligs ; that of raising artificial mounts called wer/s, on 

 which they built their houses, and whither they could, 

 upon occasion, withdraw their herds; and it likewise 



