PAPERS ON THE

AND THE

OF BRADFORD

THE BRIGANTES.

WHO were the first settlers in Yorkshire, of what race were they, and from what land did they come hither? Were they savages in the lowest signification of the word, or did they possess some of the arts which make human life bearable? Were they clothed in the skins of beasts, and did they paint, tattoo, and ornament their bodies after the fashion of some of the tribes of other nations, their food the produce of the thick tangled forests, and their habitations made of wattled boughs with the bare ground for a floor? Had they traditions, had they minstrels, and did their Saga's contain their own rude history? These are questions which can probably never be answered by the most diligent archæologist either in our own or future times. The mists which cover the remote past of Britain can never be rolled away. God the Creator alone knoweth these things, and with Him these secrets are eternally hid. We must therefore be content, and rest satisfied with the little which can be learned from our written records.

The original, or first inhabitants of Yorkshire, were perhaps the Brigantes, (1) a tribe

(1) The original inhabitants of Britain are supposed to have been a branch of the primitive family. Julius Cæsar tell us that when he landed on this coast there were at least two different races of people dwelling here. The inlanders were those whom fame

THOMAS WRIGHT.

who were known by this name to the Greeks, who recorded what the earliest Phoenician navigators reported of their discoveries.

reported to have been natives of the soil. The sea coast was peopled with Belgians; or the Cymrys and the Celts. The Greeks called them Cimmerians, the Latins, Cimbri. There were also Celts, Galatians, or Gauls. Cimmerians was a general name for both people. We have a trace in the name of Cymry of Wales, and their language called Cwmraig. Also in the word Cumberland, the part of England retained by them last when the remaining districts yielded to the Saxons. The Scotch Highlanders call themselves Gaels, and their language, Gaelic, derived from Celt. If the letter C in the words Cimbri and Celt be used hard, they sound like Gomer and Galli. Hollinshed says that Samothes, the son of Japhet, was the first ruler of Britain, and his descendants retained the sovereignty of this island 341 years. Albin, the son of Neptune, (whence the name Albion,) supplanted this dynasty, and his posterity held the power over it for 600 years, when Brutus took possession of it, whence the name Britain. A descendant of his named Ebraucus, is said to have built the city of York, A.M. 2983, or B.C. 1021. The line of country north of Trent, and south of the Tyne, and from sea to sea, was inhabited by a British tribe called the Brigantes. The east coast of Yorkshire, now called Holderness, was inhabited by a smaller tribe called the Parasoi.

Mr. Phillips (1) says, "This general title merely marked their locality, just as Gauls belonged to the country called Gallia, and Germans to the regions beyond the Rhine; it was not a distinction of race. Modern writers who call the Britons Celts, have generally in view to separate them as a race by this term from the Teutons; and those who designate them as Cymri, claim them as specially the ancestors of the Welsh. But these names were never applied by their contemporaries to the Britons; nor can we by their use determine the problem of their early migrations into these islands. Strabo (Book iv) indeed points out the physical resemblances which they manifest to the Celts, and notices some curious agreements in the habits of the two nations. The Cymri, as they now appear in Wales, have not the physical characters of the Cymbri, whose language may perhaps be reasonably admitted to have been of the Tuetonic class, while the Cymri have preserved one branch of the Celtic tongue."

As their name imports the Brigantes were' 'highlanders' and dwelt in the billy country towards the south of Britain, and had seaports both on the east and west coasts; thus extending from the German ocean to the Irish sea. Five hundred years before the birth of Christ they were visited by the adventurous sailors of the Mediteranean, Spain, Gaul, and Germany (2). In the year 55 before Christ, Julius Cæsar the first Roman emperor invaded Britain, and from that date England has a chronology, and a history, and we begin to know something defi

(1) The Rivers, Mountains, and Sea-coast of Yorkshire. With Essays on the climate, scenery, and ancient inhabitants of the county. 36 plates. By John Phillips, F.R.S., London. JOHN MURRAY, 1853.

(2) The British isles, some of them at least, were known to the Phoenicians 1,000 years before the Christian era, The Phonicians came to Cornwall and the Scilly isles for lead and tin, in exchange for which they left salt, skins and bronze. Herodotus, who lived in the fifth century before Christ, is the first writer who has made mention of the word Britain with defiuity, but the terms included the whole group of islands in this archipelago. Cæsar was the first to restrict the name to Albion (i. e., England and Scotland); and Ptolemy, in the second Christian century, calls Ireland Little Britain, and Albion he calls Great Britain. The latter term has been revived since the Legislative Union of the two countries in 1707.

nite about the oldest inhabitants of these districts. But on this subject I cannot do better than copy from Mr. Phillips. "Their principal settlements appear to have been in Yorkshire; Isu Brigantum, the port or water station of the tribe, being at or near Aldborough-the Roman Isurium But there appears reason to inclnde in their territory the elevated parts of Derbyshire, and thus we should assign to this most numerous nation a great part of the large area which extends from the Trent to the Tyne: (1) there is no other important tribe mentioned between these rivers, except the Parisoi, in the south-east of Yorkshire. "

"From this large country the Roman commanders, in the course of thirty years frequent and often bloody wars, had torn away the southern portions, and at last the whole became a conquered province, subject to tribute, encircled by camps and traversed by military roads, (2) and honoured by the births, lives, and deaths of emperors and tyrants." "Nor can we separate this people as known

(1) Tacitus mentions only three cities (properly so called,) in Britain, viz.: Camolodunum, (Colchester,) Londinium, (London,) and Verulanum, (St. Albans.) Ptolemy, writing half a century later, mentions nine in the Brigantian territory alone. On the eastern side of the vale of York, the dry Wold hills were thickly peopled along their edges. The country all round Malton was the most populous part of Yorkshire, and so it remained till a comparatively late period: the range of villages at the foot of the Wolds from Brough on the Humber to Malton, Hunmanby, and Filey; and again from Scarborough, along the south ridge of the high moorlands, by Pickering, Helmsley, &c., to Stockton-on-Tees, was most probably of British date and origin.

(2) British roads must not be confounded with those which were of Roman construction, though it is highly probable that many of the Roman roads were merely adopted British ones. The way by which the two may be distinguished is the following. British roads were generally made on the level of the country, and sometimes much below it; whereas the Roman roads were elevated above the surface of the adjoining land, and hence called high-roads. The British roads were, in general, not paved with stone. Roman roads are known to have been raised, and in many places with great labour, and to have been constructed of chalk pebbles or gravel, while the most important were paved with stone.

to the Romans from any earlier and more strictly aboriginal race. It is true that our tumuli disclose remains of Britons very unequally advanced in the arts of peace or war-men who tipped their arrows with flint, and employed hammers of stone, as well as others who were acquainted with bronze and iron. But the ages of stone, bronze, and iron, however distinctly they may appear to be in Scandinavia, are not so firmly separated here, as to giving any well-grounded hope of thus defining a Pre-Brigantine race. Nor have the few examples of authentic British crania which have been procured by the opening of the tumuli (1) yet afforded any clear testimony of successive races of early British inhabitants. The Brigantes may have been settlers among an earlier population, but we have no sure evidence of it, and the facts known appear quite reconcileable with the hypothesis of gradual change in the condition and customs of a long settled and numerous tribe."

These ancient inhabitants of north Yorkshire have left many traces of their existence as a people, in our neighbourhood. If we take a few of the names of the rivers for an example, we find that AIRE is from Air, British bright; Arw, in Gaelic, rapid stream; and these are still the characteristics of this river when unpolluted by the filth ejected from the manufactories on its banks. Without knowing the above fact, the writer of this in a "Song to the Aire," penned some years ago, used these words :

And willows low bent in thy bright waters lave.'

Thus showing how the character of a stream affects all minds. CALDER is the

(1) These were hillocks of earth or stones, and sometimes both, thrown up over the remains of the dead, to the height of from three to ten feet, of diameter three, ten, or twenty yards. Barrows are of earth, cairns are of stone. These last often made of a pyramidal form. Here we have a trace of the pyramids of Egypt. In Scotland, in cairns have been found small bags of rushes containing the ashes of children; also containing small beetles. The body was usually placed with the head to the south or north, and not to the rising sun, as was the Greek custom. Usually the body was laid on the back, or on one side, with the legs drawn up, and the arms bent so that the elbows and knees touched or approached each other. The body was often laid in a stoue cist-vaen or wooden collin.

same as Cell-dwr, British; Coel-dwr, Erse, Woody Water; and the country through which that river flows is well known to have been formerly covered with thick forests. The prevalence of such names as the following sufficiently prove this to have been the case. For instance, Outwood, Whitwood, Woodlesford, Woodchurch, Oakenshaw and Ackworth (from the oak), Alderthorpe (from the elder), Birkenshaw (from the birch), Hollinthorpe (from the holly), Hasle, Thornhill, Elmley, and many others. 1 will name one other river, the WHARFE. In Gaelic it is Garbh, rough; Garw, British. (Verbeia of the Romans) Penyghent is a British name, meaning head of the prominence (1). Baildon, Mr. Phillips supposes may be Beal-don, the hill of God. Billing, a hill near Rawden, was probably Bel ing. Mr. John James in his History of Bradford, page 25, submits to antiquarians and philologists, whether Beldon Hill, in the township of Horton, has not received its name from the circumstance of the Beltan fires of old having been kindled on its top. Beldon means in British, head or chief hill, and it was customary for the ancient Britons to light the Beltan fires upou the high places every midsummer day.

The dwellings of the Brigantes are scattered over the whole of Yorkshire. They were various, (2) and the existing specimen

(1) The language of the Brigantes is still preserved in many of our present names of rivers, mountains, places, &c. For instance, in the names of rivers. Aire, is from a Brit. ish word meaning "bright;" Don, or Dun, is from a British word meaning "dark" or "dusky;" Derwent, is from a British word, Dunwer, meaning "fair water;" Wharfe, is from a British word meaning "rough." As to mountains, we have Pen-y-ghent, Penhill, Pendle, &c.; "pen" meaning "hill," and sometimes corrupted into "ben." Thus we have Pen-y-ghent, "the hill of storms; Whernside, "the head of alders;" Morecambe, "the great hollow," or "bay;" Clitheroe, "a hollow," or "rock by the water;" Lancaster, "a stream of water.

(2) The houses of the Britons were tapering huts, constructed of wood on a circular basis. There were three varieties. 1. The first are found in the north-eastern and southeastern districts. The ground was excavated from six to eight or sixteen to eighteen feet in diameter, with a raised border, and three to five feet deep. Over this was placed a roof of branches, or rushes, and the doorway left on the side removed from the wind The flre was made in the centre, of which traces

nearest to Bradford is perhaps the one on the top of Ingleborough, near Ingleton. Mr. James thinks that the Brigantes had a town on the site of Bradford. He further adds that the historian Whitaker of Manchester says, that in these northern parts, the towns of the ancient Britons were generally in the hollows of the valleys, either upon the margin of one stream or confluence of two, for the convenience of water, and security from winds. Such a spot is the site of Bradford. A Brigantian town was merely a collection of huts in the midst of a forest, defended with a barrier formed of trees felled around, or circumscribed with a ditch. Sometimes their dwellings were in the form of pits from six to eight, or even sixteen to eighteen feet in diameter, with a raised border, and of the depth of three, four or five feet. Over these pits we must suppose a conical roof to have been formed, made weather-proof by wattling, a covering of rushes, or sods. Others were oval or circular rings, slightly excavated on the heath or drier parts of commons.

Among the remains of these aborgines are their tumuli, or burial places of their dead. Raths or mounds of a larger size than their tumuli, were probably intended as places for protection, as forts. They occur at Lofthouse, Kildale, on Danby Moor, at Kippax, Barwick in Elmet, near Leeds, and at Westow. Camps (1) and dykes, evidently of

may be seen in many of those now existing at Egton Grange, near Whitby, on Danby Moor and on Roseberry Topping. 2. The second kind has been found south of the village of Skipwith, near Riccall, south east of York. These were circular or oval, slightly excavated, and the space within a little raised by throwing up inward the excavated earth. 3. The third kind we find on the summit of Ingleborough, where there are huts formed by stones in rings, a low wall, and roof formed by inclined rafters, and covered with boughs, rushes, &c, the types of our modern cottages.

(1) These, which generally consisted of a circle of stones, thrown up on some elevated ground, are to be found in many parts of Yorkshire. I might instance one on an ele vated ground looking over Westerdale, in Danby Dale, and evidently a look-out to protect the not-distant British village on Danby Moor. Other instances occur to me, as for instance, the camps at Hutton-Ambo, Langton, Thornthorpe, &c. These are readily to be discovered, and their use so easily discerned, that I need not add anything by way of description.

Brigantine origin, yet remain, Dykes (1) are high walls or long mounds of earth, and were probably fortified places. Mr. Phillips also enumerates stone monuments, (2) circles or rings, and British pottery (3) It is also instructive to learn that the use of money was known to the Britons, and that coins of tin were used by these primitive people several hundreds of years before the birth of Christ, (4) and it is more than probable that commerce was common among them from the earliest times, though necessarily in a rude and limited form.

These people were held entirely under subjection by their priests, called Druids,

(1) These are earthworks thrown up for defence. Sometimes they are double or triple. We have instances at Acklam Wold, Garraby Hill, Ampleforth, &c.

(2) We have instanses of these in the "Long Stone" near the British village on Danby Moor;-in a stone between Hunsley Beacon and Drewton;-in a stone called by the name of St. Austin;-and, probably, in the Rudstone, at Rudstone, near Bridlington. There is also a fine sample of these ancient erections in our own neighbourhood, viz., at Harden Moor, near Bingley, where two large stones, commonly called "The Druid's Altar," are to be seen. One of the stones was probably used for receiving the fire, while on the other the victim was laid.

(3) The chief are cinerary urns, and other urns found in tumuli; often two feet high, made of clay, baked in the sun, and slightly reddened on the outside. They seem to have been formed without the use of the potter's wheel, and therefore are not very regular in shape. The ornament is usually taken from the form of interlacing twigs.

(4) At what period the British began to make use of coins is a point involved in great obscurity. Very rude coins made of tin, the metal for which the island was celebrated in early times, are occasionally found, some of which perhaps belong to the fourth century before Christ. But probably they do not belong to the earliest epoch, when coins had au impression only on one side. Some bear the name, "Camolodunum," the modern Colchester, and "Verulamium," the modern St. Albans. On British coins are found TASC. This was the abbreviation of the name, Tasciovanus, king of Verulamium about the time of Tiberius. Also S EGO, son of Tasciovanus. Also C V N O, or Cunobelinus the King Cymbeline, of Shakespeare. On the reverse, CA MV, or Camolodunum, or Colchestet, where minted.

men, who although sunk into the very depths of heathenism, yet claimed for themselves and their order a superiority bordering on the divine (1). Superstition in its worst

(1) It is a subject of deep interest how far the aborigines of Britain were a branch of the primitive and patriarchal family. That this was the case is supported by the Triads. The religion of the Druids seems to have been much more in conformity with that of Abraham and the other patriarchs than any other system of heathenism was. The opinion of the Druids as to the nature of God, was expressed by a phrase which may be thus translated,-" God cannot be matter; what is not matter, must be God." That they regarded God as a Supreme Spirit as disengaged from matter, as He was exalted above all resemblance to eternal things, is clear from this Triad:-"There are three primary Unities, and more than one cannot exist; one God, one Truth, and one point of Liberty; and this is where all opposites equally equi-preponderate."

The poetry

of the bards was often very beautiful alike in rhythm and moral sentiment. Look, for instance, at their well known Triads. In the first two lines the bard describes some objects that were visible in nature, or actions that were well known to every one; and in the third introduces some precept of morality, thus:-"Snow a robe o'er hamlet flings; in the wood the raven sings; too much sleep no profit brings."-"See the forest white with snows! hark! the storm of winter blows: nature beyond learning goes."

"Fair the moon's resplendent bow, shining o'er the mountain snow: peace the wicked never know."-The Druids, in their temples and in their worship under oaks, imitated the early mode of worship. As to worshipping under oaks, we know that "Abraham planted a grove in Beersheba, and called there on the name of the Lord, the everlasting God."-Gen. xxi. 33. We have the same in the case of the Druids, who worshipped under oaks, hence their name Druid. In the earliest ages all the places of worship had some reference to the garden of paradise. Hence we find every where, in the description of the first sacred places, some allusion to the scene of man's temptation and fall,-a garden or grove, with two or three trees in the midst, watered by a river, and enclosed to prevent un hallowed intrusion. The Priesthood was divided into three orders. Druids, dressed in white, emblematic of truth and holiness. 2. Bards, dressed in sky blue, the colour of nature, emblematic of learn

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form was prevalent amongst them. Human sacrifices were common, literally veryfying the Scriptures where it says that "The dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty;" for the old historians tell us that one of their customs was to cause enormous wicker baskets to be made, and after filling them with human beings alive, set fire to the whole and burn them to death, as a propitiation to their gods. Their religious worship was conducted in the recesses of rocky glens, deep scars, and gloomy forests. and human victims were a frequent sacrifice, On the principle of life for life, if a man were in danger of death from disease or in battle, he would vow to the gods that, if rescued, he would give them another in his stead. Should he survive, he employed the Druids to execute his vow; and if they could find a thief or an evil doer, they immediately immolated him on the altar. But if no criminal could be found, they did not scruple to take the life of the innocent. The wild fruit of the forest was their food, and their clothing was made from the skins of the wild beasts. Their shoes were like the brogues worn in Ireland, made of untanned leather. Tall of stature, they had blue eyes, and red hair, and in everything were no further advanced in civilization than many tribes of the North American Indians at the present day. And this rude people, the Brigantes, have lived through their lives, have died, and been buried, on the same spot where we live now.

Julius Cæsar in his Commentaries, gives the following account of the Druids, and of their religion.

"It is especially the object of the Druids to inculcate this-that souls do not perish, but after death pass into other bodies; and they consider that by this belief, more than anything else, men may be led to cast away the fear of death and to become courageous. They discuss, moreover, many points concerning the heavenly bodies and their motion, the extent of the universe and the

ing. The Bards were poets, the Druids priests and judges, the Ovates a mixed class, cultivators of science and art. There was an Arch Druid, who wore a girdle round his waist, on which appeared the crystal of Augury, encased in gold; round his neck was the breastplate of judgment, said to possess the salutary but uncomfortable property of garotting the wearer on the utterance of a corrupt judgment, and on each of two fingers of his right hand he wore a ring, one plain, the other the chain ring of divination.