I 



XXXVIII. 



ON THE CHARACTEE AND INFLUENCE OF THE 

 ANGLO SAXON CONQUEST OF ENGLAND, 

 AS ILLUSTEATED BY AECHAEOLOGICAL 

 EESEAECH. 



There are numerous points of general and living interest 

 relating to the Anglo-Saxon conquest of this country which are 

 very largely dependent upon archaeological research for their elucida- 

 tion. Amongst these may be mentioned the question of the extent 

 to which the Romano-British population previously in occupation 

 was extirpated ; the question of the relative position, in the scale 

 of civilisation, held by victors and vanquished ; and the question of 

 the extent of our indebtedness as to language and laws to one or 

 other of the two nationalities. Light is thrown, even upon points 

 apparently of the most purely archaeological character, from such 

 literary sources as histories of the nomenclature of localities, as the 

 records of monasteries^ as illustrations in manuscripts, and as 

 laws. But the graves of the Anglo-Saxons and their contents have 

 been for the present investigator the primary, and such literary 

 works as those alluded to, and such as many of those published 

 under the direction of the Master of the Rolls and by the Early 

 English Text Society, have been only a secondary source of in- 

 formation. They have, however, been by no means neglected 

 by him. 



It may be well to begin by stating how an Anglo-Saxon is to be 

 distinguished from a Romano-British interment. Anglo-Saxons, 

 during the period of their heathendom, which may be spoken of 

 roughly as corresponding in England to a period of some 200 or 

 300 years onwards from their first invasion of the country in force, 

 were interred in the way of cremation, and in urns of the pattern 



