With their

rior weapons, and perhaps of superior strength, and were able to overpower those whom they found in the island.

stone axes they made clearings in the woods

in which to place their settlements.

They

brought with them domestic animals, sheep and goats, dogs and pigs. They spun thread with spindle and distaff, and wove it into cloth upon a loom. They grew corn and manufactured a

rude kind of pottery. Each tribe lived in a state of war with its neighbours. A tribe when attacked in force took shelter on the hills in places of refuge, which were surrounded by lofty mounds and ditches. Many of these places of refuge are still to be seen, as, for instance, the one which bears the name of Maiden Castle, near Dorchester. On the open hills, too, are still to be found the

long barrows which the Neolithic men raised over the dead. There is little doubt that these men, whose way of life was so superior to that of their Eskimo-like predecessors, were of the race now known

SUCCESSIVE RACES

5

as Iberian, which at one time inhabited a great part of Western Europe, but which has since mingled with other races. The Basques of the Pyrenees are the only Iberians who still preserve anything like purity of descent, though even the Basques have in them blood the origin of which is not Iberian.

4. Celts and Iberians. The Iberians were followed by a swarm of new-comers called Celts. The

Celts belong to a group of races sometimes known as the Aryan group, to which also belong Teutons, Slavonians, Italians, Greeks, and the chief ancient races of Persia and India. The Celts were the first to arrive in the West, where they seized upon lands in Spain, in Gaul, and in Britain, which the Iberians had occupied before them. They did not, however, destroy the Iberians altogether. However careful a conquering tribe may be to preserve the purity of its blood, it rarely succeeds in doing so. The con

6

querors are sure to preserve some of the men of the conquered race as slaves, and a still larger number of the young and comely women to become the mothers of their children. In course of time the slaves and the children learn to speak the language of their masters or fathers, and there is therefore no European population now existing which is not derived from many races.

5. The Celts in Britain.-The Celts were fair-haired and taller than the Iberians whom they conquered or displaced. They had also the advantage of being possessed of weapons of bronze, for which even the polished stone weapons of the Iberians were no match. They burned instead of burying their dead, and raised over the ashes those round barrows which are still to be found intermingled with the long barrows of the Iberians.

6. Goidels and Britons.-The earliest known name given to this island was Albin, out of which sprang the later Albion. It is not a Celtic word, and is probably of Iberian origin. The still later name Britain is derived from a second swarm of Celts called Brythons or Britons, who after a long interval followed the first Celtic immigration. These first immigrants were distinguished from the new-comers by the name of Goidels. The language spoken by the Goidels and that spoken by the Britons were alike Celtic in their character, but there were many differences between the two. At present the languages

derived from that of the Goidels are the Gaelic of the Highlands, the Manx of the Isle of Man, and the Erse of Ireland. The only language now spoken in the British Isles which is derived from that of the Britons is the Welsh; but the old Cornish language, which was spoken nearly up to the close of the eighteenth century, came from the same stock. It therefore appears that the Britons pushed the Goidels northward and westward, as the Goidels had formerly pushed the Iberians in the same directions. It was not, however, till a much later period that the Goidels were driven to

the parts of the country which their descendants now occupy; and for a long time they were left in possession of the greater part of the western coast of Britain. It was most likely the Britons who erected the huge stone circles, such as those of Stonehenge and Avebury, which were probably intended to serve as monuments of the dead, though it is sometimes supposed that they were also used as temples.

7. Phoenicians and Greeks.-The most civilised nations of the ancient world were those which dwelt round the Mediterranean Sea. It was long supposed that the Phoenicians came to Britain

from the coast of Syria, or from their colonies at Carthage and in the south of Spain, for the tin which they needed for the manufacture of bronze. The peninsula of Devon and Cornwall is the only part of the island which produces tin, and it has therefore been thought that the Cassiterides, or tin islands, which the Phoenicians visited, were to be found in that region. It has, however, been recently shown that the Cassiterides were most probably off the coast of Galicia, in Spain, and the belief that Phoenicians visited Britain for tin must therefore be considered to be very doubtful. The first educated visitor who reached Britain was Pytheas, a Greek, who was sent by the merchants of the Greek colony of Massalia (Marseilles) about 330 B.C. to make discoveries which might lead to the opening across Gaul of a trade-route between Britain and their city. It was probably in consequence of the information which he carried to Massalia on his return that there sprang up a trade in British tin. Another Greek, Posidonius, who came to Britain about two centuries after Pytheas, found this trade in full working order. The tin was brought by land from the present Devon or Cornwall to an island called Ictis, which was only accessible on foot after the tide had ebbed. This island was probably Thanet, which was in those days cut off from the mainland by an arm of the sea which could be crossed on foot at low water. From Thanet the tin was carried into Gaul across the straits, and was then conveyed in waggons to the Rhone to be floated down to the Mediterranean.

8. Gauls and Belgians in Britain. During the time when this trade was being carried on, tribes of Gauls and Belgians landed in Britain. The Gauls were certainly, and the Belgians probably, of the same Celtic race as that which already occupied the island. The Gauls settled on the east coast as far as the Fens and the Wash, whilst the Belgians occupied the south coast, and pushed northwards towards the Somerset Avon. Nothing is known of the relations between the new-comers and the older Celtic inhabitants. Most likely those who arrived last contented themselves with mastering those whom they defeated, without attempting to exterminate them. At all events, states of some extent were formed by the conquerors. Thus the Cantii occupied the Caint (Kent), or open ground to the north of the great forest which then filled the valley between the chalk ranges of the North and South Downs; the Trinobantes dwelt between the Lea and the Essex Stour; the Iceni occupied the peninsula between the Fens and the sea which was afterwards known as East Anglia (Norfolk and