upon British Ethnology. 201
from the frontiers of Gaul and Germany must thus have
been exported into Britain, and many Britons have been
settled on the continent, without any record of the event
having come down to us. It is known, however, Mr. Seebohm
remarks, that "deportations of tribesmen of the Alamannic
group were repeatedly made into Britain."20 It is thus obvious
both that a very large number of foreign settlers must have
been introduced into Britain during the nearly four centuries
of Roman rule, and also that the settlers came from all parts
of the Roman empire.
The next invaders of Britain, the Angles, Saxons, and
Jutes, were, on the whole, a tall, fair people with oval skulls.
They appear to have first landed here about the middle of
the fifth century, soon after the withdrawal of the Romans.
The Jutes are said to have settled in Kent and the Isle of
Wight; the Saxons in Essex, Sussex, and Hampshire; and
the Angles on the east coast from Suffolk to Northumberland.
Landing in considerable numbers, and speaking a low-German
tongue mutually intelligible, it is not surprising that they
soon made themselves supreme over a considerable area of
Britain towards the east and south coast, when we consider
the care taken by the Romans to deprive the Britons of all
power or wish to help themselves, and of all feeling of nation-
ality. The documentary evidence bearing upon this invasion
is very slight and unsatisfactory, the earliest work dealing
with the subject being that of Gildas, who wrote in the
middle of the sixth century, and whose work is rather a
fiery sermon denouncing the vices of the Britons and their
chiefs, than anything else. "The notions of Gildas," says
Mr. Gairdner,21 "at least as to the order and succession of
events, are exceedingly confused and inaccurate, nor are
they in harmony with well-informed Greek and Roman
writers as to the events themselves. But from the early part
of the fifth century Greek and Roman writers tell us nothing
of the affairs of Britain, and Gildas is the original authority
used by Bede and succeeding writers as the basis of our early
English history." Bede's 'Ecclesiastical History of the
20 Seebohm, 'The English Village Community.'
21 Early 'Chroniclers of Europe.'