ROMANO-BRITISH 

 BEDFORDSHIRE 



IT would seem from the few indefinite records which we now have 

 bearing on the subject that the district known as Bedfordshire 

 was within the territory of the Belgic tribe called by Ptolemy the 

 Catyeuchlani,^ or in its Latinized form Catuvellauni,* at the time of 

 Caesar's invasion of Britain and the subjugation of the county under Claudius. 

 The lands of this tribe are supposed to have covered the greater part of the 

 present counties of Buckingham, Bedford, and Hertford, the capital of their 

 territory being Verulam, near St. Albans. The British or Late Celtic settle- 

 ments in this district, judging from the remains found, occupied the southern 

 part of what is now the county, and extended along the belt of Lower 

 Greensand and Gault of about 7 miles wide, which may be said roughly to 

 extend from Leighton Buzzard to Potton. This is a corn-growing area, and may 

 indicate that the early inhabitants' were occupied in agriculture. Roman settle- 

 ments covered the same ground as the British, or, what would seem more 

 probable, Roman influence penetrated into the homes of the British 

 inhabitants of what is now the county. Everything points to a peaceful 

 occupation by the Romans throughout the Midlands. Nothing suggestive 

 of military life has been found. Indeed, the district must have been but 

 sparsely inhabited during the Romano-British period and that preceding it. 

 Partly from this cause, and partly from the fact that Roman remains have 

 not been systematically described and recorded, our knowledge of the con- 

 ditions of the county at this date is very meagre. At Dunstable there was 

 a posting station on the Watling Street called Durocobrivae, but it was 

 evidently of no great pretensions as a town. At Bedford and Shefford were 

 stations at the fords crossing the Rivers Ouse and Ivel. These are the only 

 sites of what may perhaps be termed villages. At Sandy, and probably at 

 Kempston, from the evidence of the cemeteries and the objects found in them, 

 there must have been settlements of some importance, the sites of which have 

 not as yet been discovered. A villa apparently existed at Yelden, and the 

 vaults at Stanford, and the burials at Flitton, Kensworth, and Northill would 

 indicate settlements not far distant. 



' Ptolemy, Geographia (ed. Firmin Didot, 1883), i, 99. 



' Found on inscriptions in Cumberland and Northumberland ; Horsley, Magna Brit, xxvii. Dion 

 Cassius (Ix. 20) calls them Catuellani. 



' The Romans may have introduced agriculture into these parts, as Caesar stated that the British 

 inhabitants of the interior were for the most part pastoral in their habits {Bell. Gall, v, c. 12). Tacitus 

 found that many of the tribes were too careless or too impatient to trouble themselves with agriculture ; Vita 

 Agrk. xiv, c. 38. 



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