Cimbri rests assuredly, as we have already observed, on no other foundation than the resemblance, perhaps accidental, of the two gentile names.*

Though the conjecture of Posidonius that this northern people had descended from the Cimmerii received credit among the ancient writers, it was the prevalent opinion that the Cimbri were a German tribe. We have observed that several writers mention them as such. Pliny enumerates the Cimbri in that class of German tribes to which he appropriates the term of Ingævones, or maritime tribes. Plutarch likewise says that the Cimbri were supposed to be a German nation. The reasons on which he represents that opinion to have been founded are such, however, as plainly to evince that it was not the result of information but a mere conjecture. They were believed to be Germans, he says, on account of their tall stature and the blue colour of the eyes, and from the fact that the Germans in their language term robbersKiußpovs-Cimbri. As the Romans communicated little with the Cimbri,-who, however, sent ambassadors to Augustus,—and knew them only as living in a corner of Germany, they would naturally be led to suppose them Germans. Such an opinion has therefore little or no weight, especially as it is generally expressed with doubt as to the fact. The accounts left of the customs of the Cimbri certainly resemble what we know of the Celtic nations rather than the description of German manners. Tacitus describes them as, in his time, the feeble remnant of a nation, living in decay, and about to become extinct. He says, "In the same quarter of Germany, adjacent to the ocean, dwell the Cimbri, a small state at present, but great in renown. Of their past grandeur extensive vestiges still remain, as encampments and lines on either shore of the Cimbric Chersonesus, from the compass of which the strength and numbers of the nation may still be computed, and credit obtained to the account of so great an army."+ The sacred rites of the Cimbri as described by Strabo resemble in their more

* The history of the Cimmerii is contained in the passages of Herodotus, lib. i. c. 7. c. 16. ; lib. iv. c. 11. c. 12. c. 14. c. 99. Strabo, lib. i. p. 12.; lib. iii. p. 149. ed. Casaub. item lib. vii. p. 308. p. 494.

+ Tacitus, Germ. c. 87.

sanguinary character the customs of the Celts. Their warlike expeditions were accompanied by hoary prophetesses, who wearing white robes fastened by zones of brass, ascended a throne or elevated seat, with drawn swords in their hands, and raising the captives by their hair, cut their throats, and received streams of blood in large brazen goblets, while others dissected the bodies of slaughtered victims, and from the appearance of the entrails predicted victory to the Cimbrian arms. In battles they fought, like the Britons, in chariots: to them were fastened drums, which when beaten produced a formidable sound.*

All these considerations afford some probable evidence of the Celtic origin or relations of the Cimbri; but a stronger argument arises from a very few names and words preserved from their language. Pliny assures us that the Cimbri termed the Baltic Sea Moremarusa, which expression in their language signified the Dead Sea. Môr-marw, nearly the same words, have in Welsh precisely this meaning, which does not belong to similar vocables, as I believe, in any German dialect. Again, Boiorix was the king of the Cimbric army which invaded Italy, a compound name of which both the elements are Celtic. Boii is a gentile name, as we have seen, and belonged particularly to the Celta of Germany: orix is a frequent Celtic termination, and represents a word yet extant in the Welsh dialect. To this we must add the name of Cimbri, corresponding and nearly identical with that of the Cymru or Cumri of Britain. We must likewise take into the account the probability of migration from the Cimbric Chersonesus to the country of the Ottadini in the northern part of this island, and the fact that the Picts, probably one people with the Caledonians, derived their descent, according to Bede, from the shores of Scythia, that is from the coasts of the Baltic Sea.

I know not whether any conclusive argument can be founded on the circumstance that Holstein and Denmark abound in those rude erections termed Druidical remains; but the fact is remarkable, especially as we find similar remains in countries known to have been inhabited long by Celts, as in the departments of Morbihan in Britanny.

Strab. Ger. lib. vii. p. 294.

On the whole it appears to be the result of this comparison of facts relative to the history of the Cimbri, that they were a Celtic people allied to the inhabitants of Britain; and it is by no means improbable that they were the people who first colonized North Britain.

SECTION IX. Of the Population of the British Isles.

On entering into an inquiry respecting the tribes who formed the population of the British Isles, I approach the subject of a controversy agitated among Celtic antiquarians; but I shall endeavour to avoid disputed questions at present, and postpone the discussion of them till I can enter upon it with greater advantage, after having surveyed the whole field within which it has been carried on.

It is generally considered as certain that the whole population of Britain was derived from Gaul. Ancient writers, however, have afforded us no direct testimony that may be looked upon as conclusive upon this subject, and such an inference can only be collected from topographical names, from the history of languages, and from the remains of ancient dialects.

Cæsar says, "It has been handed down to memory-a most improbable subject for tradition-that the people who inhabit the interior part of Britain were produced in the island itself; the maritime part is possessed by those who passed over from the Belgæ, for the sake of plunder and of hostile invasion, and these are mostly distinguished by the names of those states from which they originally came to fix their abode in and to cultivate the newly conquered lands. There is an infinite number of people; their houses are very numerous, and nearly resemble those of the Gauls, and their cattle are in great numbers."*

Cæsar was informed that the sea-coast of Britain was inhabited by Belgæ from the continent. No other writer has given the same statement, but it is confirmed by our finding, from Ptolemy and others, that there were British tribes or states which, as Cæsar has hinted in the passage above cited,

*Bell. Gall. v. c. 12.

had the same names with communities in Belgic Gaul. On the south coast we find a tribe named merely Belga, whose capital was Venta Belgarum, or Winchester. To the eastward of the Belgae was another tribe, named Regni, also Rhemi, and to the northward of both of these were the Atrebatii. These are tribes nearly synonymous with Belgic tribes in Gaul. There was no other British tribe known to us by name to which the above observation of Cæsar can be supposed with probability to refer. A corner of land to the northward of the Humber is said to have been inhabited by a tribe termed Parisi, or Parisii; and Parisii was the name of a tribe in Gaul to whom belonged the banks and the islands of the Seine. But the British Parisii were apparently but a subdivision of the great nation of Brigantes, who, near the centre of the island, occupied the whole breadth of Britain: they were, perhaps, too far to the northward to have come within the sphere of Cæsar's information. The Parisii of the Seine were never reckoned among the Belgæ, although near the Belgic frontier. They were said, as we have already observed, to have been a Celtic tribe; besides, their inland situation excluded them from the number of maritime invaders of Britain. Cæsar appears therefore to have made a statement in more general terms than later accounts fully support. But although there are but two or three British tribes synonymous with tribes in Belgic Gaul, there may have been some other tribes chiefly or even wholly of Belgic origin; and it is very probable that we shall be correct in reckoning all the parts to the southward of the Atrebatii, or of a line drawn in continuation of the northern boundary of that tribe, as belonging to Belgic Britain. This line, which prolonged towards the east and the west would join the Severn and the Thames, would cut off to the southward the Cantii and the Trinobantes, as well as some other tribes connected by political relations with Belgic states on the continent, and therefore to be included with the greater probability among the tribes of Belgic origin. This last consideration renders it probable that the Iceni, who were among the most civilized of the Britons, were also Belgæ. On the other hand it may be doubted whether we ought to include among the Belgæ either the Damnonii of Devonshire

and Cornwall, or the Durotriges in Dorsetshire, since that part of the coast of Gaul which lies opposite to them was occupied by Celtic tribes, to whom, as we have seen, all the country westward of the Seine belonged.

Cæsar has said nothing to indicate a suspicion that the Britons of the inland country were akin to any people in Gaul. It is apparent that his information respecting them was very defective, and it seems that he did not consider himself to have entered their territory. What part of the entire island he meant to designate by the phrase "interior pars," has been a matter of dispute. Some who have a particular theory to support, carry us as far as the Highlands of Scotland, and will have it that the supposed indigenous Britons were the Gaël of those countries; but this is a very forced and improbable interpretation, for if the Western Highlands were at that time occupied by the Gaël, which we have reason to believe not to have been the fact, it is very improbable that Cæsar's information extended so far. It is likewise hard to suppose that he would have termed that part of Scotland the interior of Britain. It is much more likely that Cæsar meant to describe the country northward of the line above marked out, which cuts off to the southward all the tribes known to have been Belgic, of whom the most northerly were the Atrebatii. This line, as we have observed, passed from the Severn to the Thames. The aborigines will thus be the ancestors of the Britons, who are well known to have been driven by the Saxons into Wales, Cumberland, and the south-western parts of Scotland, termed the kingdom of Strathclyde.

Tacitus treats the origin of the Britons as a subject entirely left open to conjecture. Nothing was known historically as to the question whether they were natives of the soil or of foreign extraction. “In their persons they vary, whence different opinions are formed. The red hair of the Caledonians, and their large limbs, indicate a German origin. The swarthy sunburnt complexion of the Silures, their curly hair, and their situation opposite to Spain, furnished ground for believing that the Iberi have passed over the sea and gained possession of the country.' Agricola, xi.

*