212 Notes on the Evidence bearing
tinuity between Roman and Saxon times. Among them I
need hardly say are Colchester and Maldon. But for further
evidence of the survival of Roman manners, customs, &c, for
centuries after their departure from Britain, I have no space,
and can only refer those interested in the subject to Mr. Coote s
work on the Romans in Britain.
In short, the evidence seems to me to favour the view of
Professor Pearson that the more Romanized Britons, and the
many Roman colonists of various nationalities in the eastern
half of Britain, easily consented, as a rule, to exchange the
rule of Roman officials for that of Anglian or Saxon chiefs,
while the less Romanized and civilized tribes of the West
preserved more feeling of British nationality, and showed
more animosity against the Teutonic invaders. For the maps
show but few Roman towns or roads west of a line ranging
from Dorset through Gloucestershire and West Yorkshire to
the mouth of the Tweed. At the same time, as Professor
Pearson points out, the early Welsh literature shows but the
slightest acquaintance with the country east of the line just
mentioned. No doubt eastern, or the more Romanized half
of Britain was to a great extent a land alien in feeling, and
to some extent in language, to the wilder tribes of the West.
For we have the evidence of Tacitus that one of the principal
objects of the introduction of Roman luxury among the
British chiefs was to check the formation of feelings of
nationality and manly independence, and to render those
accustomed to the Roman toga and banquet the willing slaves
of Roman rule ('Agricola,' Chap. 21).
While the fact that our language is mainly Anglo-Saxon
has caused our present population to be considered as much
more Anglo-Saxon than the evidence seems to warrant, it is
probable that the Scandinavians, who only began to settle on
our shores more than four centuries after the coming of the
Angles, Saxons, and Jutes,—when the language of the latter
had established its supremacy,—must have had their numbers
and influence considerably under-estimated. Of course there
are plenty of Scandinavian place-names, especially in the
northern counties, such as Grimsby, Derby, Netherby, and