VOL. XXX.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 353 



and encouraged them to build temples, places for common assemblies, and 

 private houses, after the Roman mode; he took care to have the principal 

 youth instructed in the liberal arts: he allured them to affect the habit of the 

 Romans ; and last of all, to engage them the more firmly, encouraged a taste 

 for Roman luxury, by introducing the use of shady piazzas and baths, and their 

 way of banqueting. From hence it may be inferred, that should never any 

 other tokens of the antiquity of these works be found, yet would the bath 

 denote the age of the pavement, and set it near as high as the most early time 

 that the Romans had any real authority in this island. 



Malmsbury says, that in his time, there were here only the Abbeys of Battle 

 and Lewes, and those not long erected. The earliest mention made of it, is 

 by Bede, who informs us, that Bishop Wilfrid, in the year 678, being driven 

 from his province of Northumbria by King Ecgfrid, settled at Selsey in 680, 

 and staid 5 years, labouring in the conversion of the neighbouring parts. Bede 

 spent most of his time in the monasteries of Wiremouth and Jarrow, and tra- 

 velled little; so could leave us but few particulars. 



The next records we have, are those of Ethelwerd, the Chronicon Saxonicum, 

 and Henry, Archdeacon of Huntingdon. But that we may the more clearly 

 apprehend the ancient state of this country, we must look into the best map of 

 it. At the west end, we find West Harting and Stansted, distant from each 

 other d or 7 miles. Imagine a straight line to be drawn from Harting to Bourne, 

 near Pevensey, and another to be drawn from a point which must be little 

 south of Stanstead to Brighthelmstone; what lies north of these lines, is the 

 Weald or Low-lands, formerly the Sylva Anderida ; that which is comprehended 

 between these lines, and bounded by the sea, from Brighthelmstone to Bourne, 

 is the Downs, so famous for their pleasant situation and fruitfulness. The part 

 south of these lines, is a flat champaign ground, ending like a wedge at Bright- 

 helmstone. These two last parts were those only that were inhabited in Bede's 

 time; they contain not more than two-fifths of the whole county; which must 

 be the reason why Bede said Sussex consisted not of more than 700O families 

 or farms; whereas in another place he computes Kent to have 15000 families. 



In the three accounts above-mentioned it is agreed, that in the year 477, 

 Ella, with his three sons, Cymen, Wlencing, and Cissa, landed his forces at 

 Cymenes-ora, not far from which he routed the Britons, and drove them into 

 the Weald, Andredesteige. Their farther progress is most distinctly and natu- 

 rally delivered by the Archdeacon of Huntingdon, in these words: " The 

 Saxons possessed themselves of the sea-coast of Sudsexe, spreading gradually 

 over the country, till the 9th year after their landing in Britain ; then pene- 

 trating still more boldly into the country, the kings and rulers of the Britons 



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