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general in Britain, and Conau lord of Meiriadoc or Denbighlands. The Armoric language now spoken in Britany is a dialect of the Welsh: and so strong a resemblance still subsists between the two languages, that in our late conquest of Belleisle (1756), such of our soldiers as were natives of Wales were understood by the peasantry*. Milton, whose imagination was much struck with the old British story, more than once alludes to the Welsh colony planted in Armorica by Maximus, and the prince of Meiriadoc.

Et tandem ARMORICOS Britonum sub lege colonos".

And in the PARADISE LOST he mentions indiscriminately the knights of Wales and Armorica, as the customary retinue of king Arthur.

What resounds

In fable or romance, of Uther's son

Begirt with BRITISH and ARMORIC knights.i

This migration of the Welsh into Britany or Armorica, which during the distractions of the empire, (in consequence of the numerous armies of barbarians with which Rome was surrounded on every side,) had thrown off its dependence on the Romans, seems to have occasioned a close connexion between the two countries for many centuries. Nor will it prove

* Maximus appears to have set up a separate interest in Britain, and to have engaged an army of the provincial Britons on his side against the Romans. Not succeeding in his designs, he was obliged to retire with his British troops to the continent, as in the text. He had a considerable interest in Wales, having married Ellena daughter of Eudda, a powerful chieftain of North Wales. She was born at Caernarvon, where her chapel is still shown. Mon. Antiq. p. 166.

seq.
See Hist. de Bretagne, par d'Ar-
gentre, p. 2. Powel's WALES, p. 1, 2.
seq. and p. 6. edit. 1584. Lhuyd's Ety-
mol. p. 32. col. 3. And Galfrid. Mon.
HIST. BRIT. lib. v. c. 12. vii. 3. ix. 2.

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less necessary to our purpose to observe, that the Cornish Britons, whose language was another dialect of the antient British, from the fourth or fifth century downwards, maintained a no less intimate correspondence with the natives of Armorica: intermarrying with them, and perpetually resorting thither for the education of their children, for advice, for procuring troops against the Saxons, for the purposes of traffick, and various other occasions. This connexion was so strongly kept up, that an ingenious French antiquary supposes, that the communications of the Armoricans with the Cornish had chiefly contributed to give a roughness or rather hardness to the romance or French language in some of the provinces, towards the eleventh century, which was not before discernible'. And this intercourse will appear more natural, if we consider, that not only Armorica*, a maritime province of Gaul, never much frequented by the Romans, and now totally deserted by them, was still in some measure a Celtic nation; but that also the inhabitants of Cornwall, together with those of Devonshire and of the adjoining parts of Somersetshire, intermixing in a

ed, and which, like themselves, had dis. claimed the Roman yoke.

[That the British soldiers, enrolled by Maximus, wandered into Armorica after his death, and new named it, seems to be unfounded. I cannot avoid agreeing with Du Bos, that quant aux tems ou la peuplade des Britons insulaires s'est établie dans les Gaules, it was not before the year 513. Hist. Crit. ii. 470.-TURNER.]

It is not related in any Greek or Roman historian. But their silence is by no means a sufficient warrant for us to reject the numerous testimonies of the old British writers concerning this event. It is mentioned, in particular, by Llywarc hen, a famous bard, who lived only one hundred and fifty years afterwards. Many of his poems are still extant, in which he celebrates his twenty-four sons who wore gold chains, and were all killed in battles against the Saxons.

[Eight of the Elegies of Llywarc-Hen, or Llyware the Aged, were selected and translated by Richard Thomas, A. B. of

Jesus College, Oxford; but these translations being more distinguished by their elegance than fidelity, the learned Mr. Owen produced a literal version of the Heroic Elegies, and other pieces of this prince of the Cambrian Britons, which was published with the original text in 1792. It comprises the poem mentioned by Mr. Warton, which is marked by many poetic and pathetic passages. Llywarc flourished from about A. D. 520 to 630, at the period of Arthur and Cadwallon. See Owen's Cambrian Biography.-PARK.]

M. l'Abbé Lebeuf. RECHERCHES, &c. Mem. de Litt. tom. xvii. p. 718. edit. 4to. "Je pense que cela dura jusqu'à ce que le commerce de ces provinces avec les peuples du Nord, et de l'Allemagne, et SUR TOUT celui des HABITANS DE L'ARMORIQUE AVEC L'ANGLOIS, vers l'onzieme siecle," &c.

[Armorica was the north-west corner of Gaul, included between the Loire, the Seine, and the Atlantic.-Park.]

very slight degree with the Romans, and having suffered fewer important alterations in their original constitution and customs from the imperial laws and police than any other province of this island, long preserved their genuine manners and British character: and forming a sort of separate principality under the government of a succession of powerful chieftains, usually denominated princes or dukes of Cornwall, remained partly in a state of independence during the Saxon heptarchy, and were not entirely reduced till the Norman conquest. Cornwall, in particular, retained its old Celtic dialect till the reign of Elizabeth".

And here I digress a moment to remark, that in the circumstance just mentioned about Wales, of its connexion with Armorica, we perceive the solution of a difficulty, which at first sight appears extremely problematical: I mean, not only that Wales should have been so constantly made the theatre of the old British chivalry, but that so many of the favourite fictions which occur in the early French romances, should also be literally found in the tales and chronicles of the elder Welsh bards". It was owing to the perpetual communication kept up between the Welsh and the people of Armorica, who abounded in these fictions, and who naturally took occasion to interweave them into the history of their friends and allies. Nor are we now at a loss to give the reason why Cornwall, in the same French romances, is made the scene and the subject of so many romantic adventures. In the mean time we may observe,

m See Camd. Brit. i. 44. edit. 1723. Lhuyd's Arch. p. 253. [It did not entirely cease to be spoken till of late years, as may be gathered from an account of the death of an old Cornish woman, in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1785. PARK.]

"The story of LE COURT MANTEL, or the BOY AND THE MANTLE, told by an old French troubadour cited by M. de Sainte Palaye, is recorded in many manuscript Welsh chronicles, as I learn from original letters of Lhuyd in the Ashmolean Museum. See Mem. Anc. Chev. i. 119. And Obs. Spenser, i. §. ii. p. 54.55.

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(what indeed has been already) implied, that a strict intercourse was upheld between Cornwall and Wales. Their languages, customs, and alliances, as I have hinted, were the same; and they were separated only by a strait of inconsiderable breadth. Cornwall is frequently styled West-Wales by the British writers. At the invasion of the Saxons, both countries became indiscriminately the receptacle of the fugitive Britons*. We find the Welsh and Cornish, as one people, often uniting themselves as in a national cause against the Saxons. They were frequently subject to the same prince, who sometimes resided in Wales, and sometimes in Cornwall; and the kings or dukes of Cornwall were perpetually sung by the Welsh bards. Llygad Gwr, a Welsh bard, in his sublime and spirited ode to Llwellyn, son of Grunfludd, the last prince of Wales of the British line, has a wish, "May the prints of the hoofs of my prince's steed be seen as far as CORNWALL." Traditions about king Arthur, to mention no more instances, are as popular in Cornwall as in Wales: and most of the romantic castles, rocks, rivers, and caves, of both nations, are alike at this day distinguished by some noble atchievement, at least by the name, of that celebrated champion. But to return.

About the year 1100, Gualter, archdeacon of Oxford, a learned man, and a diligent collector of histories, travelling through France, procured in Armorica an antient chronicle written in the British or Armorican language, entitled, BRUT-YBRENHINED, or THE HISTORY OF THE KINGS OF BRITAIN'.

tioned in the Romance of the Rose was more probably the " Pays de Cornuaille" in France, a name formerly given to a part of Bretagne.-DOUCE.]

[The chronicle of the Abbey of Mont St. Michael, gives the year 513 as the period of the flight into Bretagne: Anno 513 venerunt transmarini Britanni in Armoricam, id est minorem Britanniam. The ancient Saxon poet (apud Duchesne Hist. Franc. Script. 2. p. 148.) also peoples Bretagne after the Saxon conquest.-TURNER.]

Who was sometimes chosen from Wales and Cornwall, and sometimes from

ARMORICA. Borlase, ubi supr. p. 408. See also p. 375. 377. 393. And Concil. Spelman. tom. i. 9. 112. edit. 1639. fol. Stillingfleet's Orig. Brit. ch. 5. p. 344. seq. edit. 1688. fol. From CORNUWALLIA, used by the Latin monkish historians, came the present name Cornwall. Borlase, ibid. p. 325. Evans, p. 43.

r In the curious library of the family of Davies at Llanerk in Denbighshire, there is a copy of this chronicle in the handwriting of Guttyn Owen, a celebrated Welsh bard and antiquarian about the year 1470, who ascribes it to Tyssilio a bishop, and the son of Brockmael

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This book he brought into England, and communicated it to Geoffrey of Monmouth, a Welsh Benedictine monk, an elegant writer of Latin, and admirably skilled in the British tongue. Geoffrey, at the request and recommendation of Gualter the archdeacon, translated this British chronicle into Latin, executing the translation with a tolerable degree of purity and great fidelity, yet not without some

Yscythroc prince of Powis. Tyssilio indeed wrote a HISTORY OF BRITAIN; but that work, as we are assured by Lhuyd in the ARCHEOLOGIA, was entirely ecclesiastical, and has been long since lost.

[The Brut of Tyssilio was published in the second volume of the Welsh Archæology. A translation by the Rev. P. Roberts has since appeared under the title of: A Chronicle of the British kings. The first book of Guttyn Owain's copy being much more ample in its details than the other MSS., was incorporated by Mr. Roberts in his volume. The remaining books appear to contain no material variations.-EDIT.]

See Galfr. Mon. L. i. c. 1. xii. 1. 20. ix. 2. Bale, ii. 65. Thompson's Pref. to Geoffrey's Hist. Transl. edit. Lond. 1718. p. xxx. xvi.

Geoffrey confesses, that he took some part of his account of king Arthur's atchievements from the mouth of his friend Gualter, the archdeacon; who probably related to the translator some of the traditions on this subject which he had heard in Armorica, or which at that time might have been popular in Wales. Hist. Brit. Galfr. Mon. lib. xi. c. i. He also owns that Merlin's prophecies were not in the Armorican original. Ib. vii. 2. Compare Thompson's Pref. ut supr. p. xxv. xxvii. The speeches and letters were forged by Geoffrey; and in the description of battles, our translator has not scrupled frequent variations and additions.

I am obliged to an ingenious antiquarian in British literature, Mr. Morris of Penbryn, for the following curious remarks concerning Geoffrey's original and his translation. "Geoffrey's SYLVIUS, in the British original, is SILIUS, which in Latin would make JULIUS. This illustrates and confirms Lam

barde's BRUTUS JULIUS. Peramb. Kent, p. 12. See also in the British bards. And hence Milton's objection is removed. Hist. Engl. p. 12. There are no FLAMINES OF ARCHFLAMINES in the British book. See Usher's Primord. p. 57. Dubl. edit. There are very few speeches in the original, and those very short. Geoffrey's FULGENIUS is in the British copy SULIEN, which by analogy in Latin would be JULIANUS. See Milton's Hist. Eng. p. 100. There is no LEIL in the British; that king's name was LLEON. Geoffrey's CAERLISLE is in the British CAERILEON, or West-Chester. In the British, LLAW AP CYNFARCH, should have been translated LEO, which is now rendered LоTH. This has brought much confusion into the old Scotch history. I find no BELINUS in the British copy; the name is BELI, which should have been in Latin BELIUS, OF BELGIUS., Geoffrey's BRENNUS in the original is BRAN, a common name among the Britons; as BRAN AP DYFNWAL, &c. See Suidas's Beny. It appears by the original, that the British name of CARAUSIUS was CARAWN; hence TREGARAUN, i. e. TREGARON, and the river CARAUN, which gives name to ABERCORN. In the British there is no division into books and chapters, a mark of antiquity. Those whom the translator calls CONSULS of Rome, when Brennus took it, are in the original TwYSOGION, i. e. princes or generals. The Gwalenses, GwALO, or GWALAS, are added by Geoffrey, B. xii. c. 19." To what is here observed about SILIUS, I will add, that abbot Whethamsted, in his MS. GRANARIUM, mentions SILOIUS the father of Brutus. "Quomodo Brutus SILO filius ad litora Angliæ venit," &c.

GRANAR. Part. i. Lit. A. MSS. Cotton. NERO, C. vi. Brit. Mus. This gentleman has in his possession a very autient manuscript of the original,

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