Full History of Roman Britain - Documentary

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 5:00: Roman Britain, Fire of Learning, Ptheus of Misalia
2. 10:00 – 15:00: Claudius
3. 15:00 – 20:00: Buudaca, Claudius
4. 20:00 – 25:00: Roman Britain, Agricola, Hadrien, Buudaca
5. 25:00 – 30:00: Roman Britain
6. 30:00 – 35:00: Roman Britain
7. 35:00 – 40:00: Anglo-Saxon, Constantine the Great, Hadrien, Pelagius
8. 40:00 – 40:47: Fire of Learning

Notable quotes from "Full History of Roman Britain - Documentary"

• That the insular Celtic and classical Roman worlds clashed and then merged to create a new society that of Roman Britain. The Romans would stay in Britain for almost 400 years.…

  about Roman Britain · at 0:25

• First confirmed writings describing Britain came from a Greek explorer named Ptheus of Misalia, who sailed to the north of Europe sometime around the years 330 to 320 BC. While…

  about Ptheus of Misalia · at 4:48

• Throughout this period multiple times, though these never materialized. Then in 41 AD, Claudius became emperor.

  about Claudius · at 12:39

• Lit a fire in the Eckenny, a previously pacified people, most of all in their queen, whose name was Buudaca.

  about Buudaca · at 18:08

• Arguably, Agricola would be Roman Britain's most accomplished governor.

  about Agricola · at 20:43

• Into Roman territory and rebellions in the north along Rome's frontier. In 122 AD, the emperor Hadrien established a frontier in modern-day northern England along which he…

  about Hadrien · at 22:49

• Year, the emperor Constantine, the same who later ruled over the whole of the empire and is remembered as Constantine the Great, embraced Christianity following his momentous…

  about Constantine the Great · at 35:02

• Warlike peoples from modern-day Germany, Denmark, and the lands, collectively known as the Anglo-Saxons.

  about Anglo-Saxon · at 39:43

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Claudius — Person · 5 mentions · first at 12:44
• Buudaca — Person · 3 mentions · first at 18:12
• Hadrien — Person · 3 mentions · first at 22:54
• Agricola — Person · 2 mentions · first at 20:43
• Ptheus of Misalia — Person · 1 mention · first at 4:52
• Constantine the Great — Person · 1 mention · first at 35:06
• Pelagius — Person · 1 mention · first at 35:40
  The following century however Romano British Christians like the heretic Pelagius and the esteemed missionary St.
• St. Patrick — Person · 1 mention · first at 35:40
  The following century however Romano British Christians like the heretic Pelagius and the esteemed missionary St.

Companies & orgs

• Fire of Learning — Company · 2 mentions · first at 0:55
  Distinct society and the fascinating era of history in which it existed. Ladies and gentlemen, hello and welcome to Fire of Learning's history of nations and peoples…

Concepts & topics

• Roman Britain — Concept · 14 mentions · first at 0:30
• Anglo-Saxon — Concept · 1 mention · first at 39:48

Full transcript with timestamps

0:02 Britannia was what the Romans called it. Initially, it was regarded as a dark and mysterious land, one which many Romans were skeptical even existed. But in 53 BC, the Romans would venture here for the first time under the command of the great Julius Caesar himself. A century later, the Romans returned to claim this land for themselves, incorporating it into their mighty empire. It was then that the insular Celtic and classical Roman worlds clashed and then merged to create a new society that of Roman Britain. The Romans would stay in Britain for almost 400 years. The effects of their presence are visible here to this very day, not merely in the ruins that do the island, but in many ways in the very extent structure of modern British society itself. In this video, we will tell the story of this distinct society and the fascinating era of history in which it existed. Ladies and gentlemen, hello and welcome to Fire

0:57 of Learning's history of nations and peoples documentary series. Thank you for joining us in this episode as we add Roman Britain to the list of nations and peoples whose history we have covered in our documentary series. Before we begin, we would like to thank Androni Coel Marez, Larica the News Elf, Christian Holmes, and Saquon Huntington for being our most recent supporters on Patreon. They join these supporters listed here who helped to make these videos possible. Now then, let's get to it. Before we discuss Roman Britain, we must give a brief summary of British history before the Romans to truly understand this land. because of an almost total absence of written records. The history of the island of Britain before the 1st century AD is very poorly understood and heavily debated. But things like archaeology, DNA studies, linguistic analysis, and a few written records in the latter part of this period have been

1:52 used to help us gain an understanding of this time period. While the land that would one day come to be known to the Romans as Britannia had been inhabited by humans long before the year 4000 BC, it is roughly around this year that agriculture spread to the area, resulting in a pivotal shift in the history of the land. Agriculture ended the huntergatherer lifestyle that had previously existed here and became the foundation for life in Britain in ways that remain fundamental to this very day. Around 2500 BC, the island started becoming inhabited by invaders from the continent known as the Bellbeaker culture. Little is known of these beaker people, but they seem to have been a people with significant Yamna or step ancestry who took over the whole of the island, likely quite violently, introducing a new culture and likely Indo-European languages to the area.

2:44 Importantly, they also brought bronze working to Britain, bringing the island into the Bronze Age. Britain's Bronze Age is generally overshadowed by the histories of the great Bronze Age civilizations in the Eastern Mediterranean. But it is worth noting that Britain was not completely isolated from these civilizations. Though they most likely never knew of each other, British goods did make their way through complex trade networks into the Mediterranean world. Most important of these was tin. The metal which defined this era, bronze, is an alloy of copper and tin, the latter of which Britain, specifically Cornwall in Devon in the southwest, was especially rich in.

3:21 British tin has been discovered in the Mediterranean dating from this time. During the Bronze Age collapse around, 1200 BC, however, these networks seem to have broken down. Around 8 to 700 BC, Britain entered the Iron Age, named of course for the introduction of ironwork into the region. Around this point, the island had become largely inhabited by tribes whom we would today describe as Kelts. The term Kelt is a somewhat complicated term. Suffice it to say that it does not refer to a single homogeneous ethnic group. Rather, in this context, it is a broad term used by historians to describe many separate peoples across the continent and even in Anatolia who spoke Celtic languages.

4:04 Consistent with this, the Kelts of Britain do not appear to have regarded themselves as Celtic or as a single people at any point in ancient history, identifying instead with the individual tribes to which they belonged. Though the societies of at least the southern and central British Kelts did generally closely share many important cultural, religious, and linguistic aspects such that the Romans lumped them together. How Britain became predominantly Celtic remains a heavily debated mystery and a conversation for another time. As mentioned, the Celtic peoples who lived in what is today England and Wales in this time whom historians call Britons, did not have much in the way of written records. And so we rely heavily on the writings of foreigners to gain a detailed understanding of them. The first confirmed writings describing Britain came from a Greek explorer named Ptheus of Misalia, who sailed to the

4:54 north of Europe sometime around the years 330 to 320 BC. While Ptheus was almost certainly not the first from the Mediterranean world to reach Britain, his writings are the earliest remaining that discuss it. Though his book was eventually lost and only fragments of his writings were preserved by Roman authors. Ptheus seems to have sailed along the coast of Britain and explored a great deal of it, landing on it and interacting with the natives. He referred to the island as Pratani, the land of the Pratani. The Romans later adopted this word as Britannia from where we get the word Britain. The word seems to mean the painted ones or the land of the painted ones, a reference to the designs the peoples of Britain made on their skin with blue dye. More on that in a bit. A more detailed understanding of ancient Britain comes to us from the later Romans. The first of them to describe it being a great

5:46 commander and a rising star in the Roman world at the time by the name of Julius Caesar. He and especially the Romans that followed in his footsteps would change British history forever. Between the years 500 and 100 BC, the Roman Republic had grown from a humble citystate nestled in the center of the Italian peninsula into the dominant power of the Mediterranean world. In 58 BC, Roman general Julius Caesar began to push Roman borders northward into what is today modern France, known to the Romans as Gaul. The Romans regarded the Britain as separate peoples from the Gauls, though they were, according to Tacitus, very similar in many ways. Some British tribes in the south at this time were actually even ruled by people from Gaul that had recently taken over parts of the island. Because of the ties that some British and Galish tribes had, some of the Britons provided support to their Gullish neighbors against Caesar during

6:45 his invasion. Thus, in 55 BC, Caesar retaliated by invading Britain. Britain at this time was a deeply mysterious place to the Romans. As mentioned, it had technically been known to the peoples of the Mediterranean for centuries, albeit very poorly. Indeed, some Romans even argued that Britain did not exist and that Ptheus had made it up. Interestingly, it seems that even Julius Caesar's invasions would not convince everyone of Britain's existence. As according to Plutarch, there were still some Romans who denied its existence for a short while after, believing Caesar's invasions were a hoax. For the Romans who did believe in Britain, it was a strange land at the edge of the world, rumored to be home to supernatural forces and fearsome creatures. Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice, once in 55 BC and again in 54 BC.

7:38 Caesar's first invasion was something of a mild failure. His men stormed the shore of Pegwell Bay in Kent in the southeast, drove the Britain off, and then constructed a fort. Soon after, a storm damaged his transport ships. He repaired them while suffering British harassment, then left. The second invasion was more successful. Caesar led a larger force to the island and was able to defeat and receive the submission of his primary rival, Cavalonis, king of the powerful Catavalani tribe and leader of the coalition of tribes, united against Caesar. However, overall, nothing too major came of either of these expeditions. Caesar established client kings, but gained no territory. However, Caesar's goal does not seem to have been to claim Britain for Rome, but rather to show the Britons the cost of opposing Rome, to explore the island, not only now Rome's new frontier, but a land rumored to be quite wealthy for

8:32 potential future opportunities, and to bolster his own reputation as a great conqueror. In each of these aims, he was successful. Caesar's descriptions of the island and its peoples in his GIC war are of great value to history. He and other Roman authors that came in the years after give fascinating, albeit limited descriptions of what life was like here at this time. As mentioned, the Celtic Britain were not a single people, but rather were divided into a number of different tribes led by various kings spread across the island all the way up to the fur of fourth or so. the land beyond which was inhabited by the mysterious peoples the Romans called the Pictti or the Picts. The Britain were regarded as simple warlike peoples often engaged in conflict with each other, though most spent most of their time living the lives of subsistence farmers and pastoralists.

9:22 Caesar claimed that the most civilized area of the island was Kent. The Romans viewed the Britain as formidable warriors. They sometimes fought covered in a blue war paint traditionally said to have been made from a flowering plant called wo which they believed had magical protective qualities. Although there is some debate about this subject. Unlike the Kelts of Gaul, they still used chariots in battle which very much stuck out to the Romans. They spoke variations of a Celtic tongue now called brethonic or common bretononic which is the ancestor of the modern-day Welsh, Cornish, and Breton languages. Though for the record, not Irish Gaelic or Scottish Gaelic. Those belonged to a separate family. They were often clean shaven apart from mustaches which were popular. Their hair was often long and sometimes lightened from having washed it with lime water. Jewelry was common.

10:11 What disgusted the Romans, however, was the fact that these peoples often wore pants. That was right up there with human sacrifice in terms of outrageousness. Speaking of human sacrifice, regarding their religious practices and beliefs, as is discussed in the 1997 book, The Ancient Kelts by Barry Conliff, the Britain were polytheistic, worshiping multiple deities. Many deities, beliefs, and practices were shared across Britain, but there was also regional variation as well as variation across time, which could be significant. Their religion seems to have been heavily intertwined with the natural world. Caesar as well as other later Roman authors like Tacitus and Lucan do claim that human sacrifice was practiced which deeply disturbed the Romans. Of particular interest are the Druids. The Druids were an elite class of religious authorities who as Conliff put it mediated interactions between the natural and

11:04 supernatural world. Many of their practices and beliefs are unknown to history owing to what seems to have been an intentional secrecy and lack of writing. The Druids also played a significant role in the political and legal administration of their tribes. Caesar noted that there were druids in Gaul as well, but suggests that Druidism was most prevalent in Britain, at least by this time. There were no true cities in Britain at the time. The largest settlements were fortified towns, which the Romans called Opida, singular Opidum. It should be remembered that because the peoples of Britain and Northern Europe in general for that matter did not leave behind extensive written records from this time, our understanding of who they were is very poor. And what we do know is heavily influenced by the writings of the Romans as well as Christian monks who recorded oral traditions after often centuries

11:54 after the conversion of the Athens to Christianity. The Romans, especially those like Julius Caesar, cannot be seen as perfect nor even neutral sources. As foreigners, they likely unintentionally misunderstood a great deal about cultures with which they had little experience. As conquerors, there was an incentive to intentionally misrepresent them to justify conquering them. Likewise, the claims of later medieval Christian authors must also be taken with a grain of salt for similar reasons. Rome would retain its conquest in Gaul, but it would be a century before they returned to Britain with the sword at least. For in the meantime, trade between the island and Rome was established and the Romans came to better understand Bratannio. The emperors Augustus and Caligula seriously considered an invasion of Britain throughout this period multiple times, though these never materialized. Then in

12:44 41 AD, Claudius became emperor. Roman Emperor Claudius rose to the imperial throne in 41 AD, much to the surprise of many alive at the time. Originally barred from political life on account of his physical disabilities, he became emperor when the bodyguard of the previous emperor, his nephew Caligula, did what the Roman emperor's bodyguard would be famous for. Killed the emperor. Perhaps believing Claudius a weak man they could easily control. They pronounced him emperor when they apparently found him hiding behind a curtain immediately after completing their assassination. But Claudius was underestimated. He was an intelligent and ambitious man and had the potential to lead the empire still in its prime to further greatness. However, he would have to prove this to overcome his reputation of weakness and encourage his people to forget that he had come to power illegitimately. Conquest was an

13:39 effective way to do that. As Claudius and his officials deliberated on lands to conquer, he decided that that strange island across the channel was the best available candidate. In 43 AD, Claudius used the recent expansion of the southeastern British Catavalani tribe, which threatened the balance of power on the island and led to the expulsion of one of Rome's client kings as a pretense to invade Britain. After a brief hesitation on the part of his men at the prospect of not only venturing to but conquering a frightening alien world, he sent a force of 40,000 men led by a commander named Owl Platius to conquer the island. They landed unopposed in modern Kent and began marching inland.

14:22 The Britain had never seen a single army of such a size, let alone one so well equipped and orderly. Yet, in spite of their awe, they would resist. A large coalition of British tribes led by the brother kings Kuraticus and Toadumnus met the Romans at the battles of Medway and the Tempames not long after their landing. Suffering terrible defeats which allowed the Romans to establish a firm foothold on the island. Tugodnus was possibly killed in this fighting and Katakus was forced to flee. When a sufficiently large region had been pacified, the emperor Claudius himself arrived at top a great beast unknown to the Britain that the Romans called in Elephantis to further stun them with Rome's magnificence and power and encourage their submission. A top this beast, he entered the capital of the Catavalani tribe in Opidum called Cumulo Dunan, modern-day Colchester. The name was latinized to Camulo Dunham, though

15:18 the official name would be Colonia Claudia, the city of the Claudian victory. The invasion thus far had gone quite well for the Romans, a testament to the efficiency of their military, but it was not over yet. Only a small portion of southeastern Britain was occupied, and Caraticus was still on the run, intent on regrouping and continuing the fight. In the subsequent years, Roman expansion into Britain slowly continued. Some Britain submitted to the Roman title wave without much of a fight in hopes of retaining a degree of power and sparing their people. Others fought to the bitter end, even in the face of this much more powerful foe. Katakus took command of a coalition of Western British tribes in modern Wales, namely the Salures and Orvikes. The Roman general ow Plaudius was replaced by Publius Otorius Scapula in 47 AD who defeated Kuraticus again in 50 AD managing to capture his family though

16:12 not him. Katakus now fled north to the Bantes a tribe in modern-day northern England but he was betrayed by their queen Cardamandua a collaborator with Rome who seized him and handed him to the Romans. Caraticus was taken to the city of Rome itself where it was intended that he be paraded and executed. However, according to the Roman historian Tacitus, he supposedly gave a stirring speech that convinced Claudius to pardon him and allow him to live the rest of his life in Rome. In 54 AD, the emperor Nero succeeded Claudius and continued to push into the more rugged lands of Britain outside the southeast. These lands, on account of this ruggedness, would be harder to tame. It was primarily the fertile southeast that the Romans were interested in, but the Romans soon realized that protecting that region meant subjugating those beyond it. By 60 AD, much of what is now southern England was under Roman control. After two

17:09 decades of occupation, during which some Romans had begun to settle in Britain, the island was starting to look a little bit Roman, but it was still not over yet. It was around 60 AD that Prasutagus, the king of a tribe in the southeast of Britain in modern-day Norfolk called the Ekeni died. The Ekeni had surrendered to Rome relatively quickly when the invasion came, and the Romans allowed them to retain a great degree of autonomy as a result, allowing Prasutagus to rule as a client king. Prasutagus intended for his kingdom to be divided between Nero and his daughters upon his death. But the Romans had other designs. When he died, the Romans declared his entire kingdom to be under their administration and aggressively entered it, confiscating and plundering the land. When Proatagus' widow protested, she was beaten, and her daughters were violated by the Romans.

18:03 This grave betrayal and attack on their people would not be taken lightly. It lit a fire in the Eckenny, a previously pacified people, most of all in their queen, whose name was Buudaca. According to Casius Theo, Buudaca rallied her people and those of neighboring tribes with moving speeches and encouraged them to rise up against the Romans. Desperate for vengeance, they answered her call and rose in rebellion against Rome. Buuda's rebellion not only erupted with great ferocity, but was totally unexpected. The Roman governor, Suetonius Pinus, and many of his men were busy on the other side of the island, conquering what seems to have been a major bastion of British resistance, the island of Anglesy, north of Wales. As such, the southeast was frighteningly undermanned.

18:51 The British rebellion immediately began a march towards Camulo Dunham. They soon arrived, easily overcoming the inadequate force left to defend it. They looted and destroyed the entire city and then burned it to the ground. Other Roman settlements such as a town called Londinium were soon to follow. The brutality the Romans had shown the Britons was repaid in full. Casius Dio estimated that perhaps 80,000 people were killed. Probably an exaggeration, but the destruction is clear in the archaeological record and shows that this was no trivial riot. The revolt was so great that it nearly unlatched Roman hold over Britain entirely. Eventually, Pinus and his men arrived and confronted Buudaca and her army at the Battle of Watling Street. Pinus commanded an army of 10,000 men. Casillo claimed that Buudaca's army numbered over 200,000.

19:44 Again, likely a substantial exaggeration, but they may very well have had a much larger force than the Romans. It would not save them. Indeed, the Britain, not merely the rebel warriors, but the families who had accompanied them were brutally annihilated here. Had this battle been lost, it is possible that it would have meant the end for Roman Britain entirely, with British history then potentially playing out very differently. Buudaca was said to have fled and poisoned herself soon after. With this defeat, southeastern British resistance to Roman rule began to dwindle. And though smaller rebellions would still occur, the area became a more reliable part of the empire with a heavy number of soldiers kept there to make sure of it. Settlements like Camulo Dunham and Londinium would be rebuilt.

20:30 The expansion further into Britain and development and romanization of the island would continue for the next several decades. In 78 AD under the emperor of Vespasian, Nyas Julius Agricala became governor of Britain. Arguably, Agricola would be Roman Britain's most accomplished governor. Upon his ascension, he had already distinguished himself by suppressing a revolt led by the Bgantes among a number of other accomplishments. Agricola began his governorship by completing the conquest of Wales, then set his sights north, marching all the way to the lands of the picss into a region the Romans called Calonia. Today, Calonia is a term used to refer to all of Scotland, but the Romans tended to use it to refer to the Scottish Highlands specifically.

21:16 Agrical faced little resistance all the way up to the Scottish lands. However, his attempt to subdue Calonia in 82 AD triggered a massive response. The various Highland tribes refused Roman occupation and seeing the mutual threat before them, united under a ruler named Calgakis. According to Agricala's son-in-law, Tacitus, whom historians have accused of embellishing his father-in-law's career, a great battle ensued between the Romans and Caledonian picss at a location now unknown called Mons Grapius. The Caledonians were said to have had more than 30,000 men, the Romans a roughly equivalent size.

21:55 However, the Romans were able to decisively take the field, slaying 10,000 Caledonians and taking less than 1,000 losses. Agrical sent his fleet to travel around the northern coast of Britain not long after, thereby confirming that it was indeed an island, though it is doubtful that this was entirely unknown to the Romans before Gricala's campaign. Agricola had opened the door to Roman occupation of the lands to the north, but Rome's grip on the region was still tenuous. When Agricala was recalled in 85 AD for uncertain reasons, and when a significant portion of Roman forces were recalled to handle conflicts on the continent, many of Agricala's gains in the north were lost. Pacifying Calonia and incorporating it into the empire seemed too much of a difficult, costly, and time-consuming process. The chain of events in Britain for the next few decades are poorly understood, but it seems that there were pictish incursions

22:49 into Roman territory and rebellions in the north along Rome's frontier. In 122 AD, the emperor Hadrien established a frontier in modern-day northern England along which he began the construction of the famous Hadrien's wall. The wall ran for 73 mi from coast to coast, specifically from modern walls on the river Tine to the Soulway F. It stood at 18 feet in height and was 9 ft thick. To the south of the wall was Roman Britain. To the north the untamed or free depending on which side of the wall you were on lands of the pits and tribes of northern Britons. The purpose of the wall was of course primarily to prevent pictish raids and attacks or at least to slow them down and defend the province with fewer men garrison there. But more broadly, it allowed the Romans to monitor trade and movement in and out of Britain more closely and to tax those entering the province. Rome's expansionist ambitions were not fully

23:45 contained by the wall. However, in the decades and centuries that followed, the Romans would still attempt to control the land to the north beyond it multiple times. In 139 AD, the emperor Antonyinus Pius instructed the governor of Britain, Quintis Licus Urbus, to invade the Scottish lands. This campaign is not well recorded, but it may have been undertaken in response to Pikish harassment. In 142, a new wall made of turf rather than stone was constructed in modern Scotland called the Antonine wall which stretched from the first of fourth to the 4th of Clyde. However, these conquests would not hold and Antonine's wall was abandoned by the emperor Marcus Aurelius by 164.

24:27 Hadrien's wall then marked the true border and the northernmost edge of Rome's conquests for most of Roman Britain's history. The Romans theoretically could have conquered the whole of Britain, but they were not omnipotent, and it seems they always felt that there were more pressing issues or lucrative opportunities elsewhere along the empire's borders towards which their limited time, energy, and resources were worth directing. For the record, Rome would also never make a serious effort to sail west to conquer Ireland, or as they called it, Hibernia, Hibernia. Some had considered it. Agricula, for example, had once remarked that a single legion could conquer all of Hiburnia. Perhaps an unrealistic boast, though, if the Roman military ever did become involved in Irish affairs and make an expedition there, and it is possible that they did, it was probably under Arica for the purpose of supporting a friendly king.

25:19 Had Rome been able to subdue the whole of Britain, expansion into Hiburnia might have become a reality, though the former never happened, and thus neither did the latter. That being said, the Hiburnians and Romans did trade and interact with each other throughout the Roman period. Before we continue, we would like to take a moment to ask that you give this video a like if you do in fact like it, and consider subscribing to support our channel and keep up with more videos like this in the future. Now, back to the video.

25:51 By now, a hundred years had passed since the Romans first invaded Britain, and their rule would endure for centuries more. In that time, what is termed by historians as a Romano British culture developed there. As mentioned, the southeast would be more romanized than the rest of Britain. It was here in cities and towns like Cumulo Dunham, Londinium Verilamium Lindam Aboricum Glaim and Aquaulis that the advancements and luxuries of Roman civilization could be readily found allowing the people here a relatively high standard of living and a Roman lifestyle. Some settlements had been founded by the Romans. Many were romanized settlements founded before them by the Britain. Many settlements had aqueducts which carried water to them, forms, temples, theaters and amphitheaters, public baths, organized street grids, even sewage systems, and a form of central heating.

26:42 The settlements were connected by a complex system of roads spanning the province. Seawar and Hollister claimed in his book, The Making of Britain, that the Roman roads would not be equal until the 19th century. In the countryside, extravagant and comfortable farming estates called villas, owned by the island's wealthiest, which looked very much like those in Italy, could be found. Foods and other trade goods, some of which had seldom or even had never been seen in Britain before, were introduced, imported, and grown by the Romans. All this being said, Britannia was never romanized to quite the same extent as many other parts of the empire. As you moved away from the cities and villas, especially outside the southeast, you would have increasingly found the Britain living as their ancestors did, as subsistence farmers, especially again in the north and west as pastoralists. Such people comprised the majority of Roman

27:34 Britain's 2 million inhabitants. Britain's population, for the record, amounted to roughly 3% of the empire's total population at its height. In lands such as modern Cornwall, Wales, and Northern England, the presence of Roman civilization was much more tenuous. The presence here was primarily of a military nature, though these regions did economically benefit the empire, being wealthy in mineral resources, for example. While the Roman presence here was lighter, it is important to note that the client kings had been done away with by the second century, and so these areas were under direct Roman rule as well. The lack of romanization was owed to the fact that Britannia was a relatively distant rural backwater of the empire. This was not necessarily always a bad thing. Roman Britain is not often mentioned by contemporary historians once the initial conquests were over and therefore was perhaps a

28:26 relatively decent, quiet place to live if you were willing to give up the Mediterranean climate. This was of course most true in the southeast, but even in the rugged regions outside it, the heavy presence of the Roman military kept life relatively quiet compared to the world outside it. For the record, because DNA studies suggests that the Romans did not leave behind a major genetic presence in the modern inhabitants of the island, it seems many Romans were not in fact willing to give up the Mediterranean climate. Regarding language, Latin was the main language of the cities, spoken primarily by Roman settlers and the educated elite Britain.

29:02 But outside the cities, the Celtic Brethonic language became more common. Likely, many Britain could not even speak Latin, at least not well, even centuries after the conquest. Regarding religion, the nature of both Roman and Celtic polytheism allowed for a fair amount of coexistence and synretatism. The Romans generally were not terribly bothered by the religious practices and beliefs of conquered peoples, provided they were not too contradictory to Roman beliefs or interests. As such, Celtic paganism endured throughout the Roman period. Human sacrifice was over, however, and the Druids, who had so enthusiastically drumed up support against the Romans, were seemingly driven to extinction, though there are vague, unreliable references to their persistence up to the end of Roman Britain. In some cases, Celtic deities were argued to be the same as the Roman ones by different names and thus

29:53 syncretically conjoined. As Simon Scayman noted in his book, A History of Britain, the temple in the Roman British city of Aquais, or Bath, for example, is dedicated to Sulis Manurva. Sulis likely being a local Celtic goddess associated with healing linked to the thermal springs of the area. Manurva being the Roman goddess of wisdom, war, and notably in this instance, medicine. But Roman rule over Britain was not to last forever. For Rome itself was not to last forever. In the late 2nd century, changes began to occur during the reign of the emperor Comeodus that signaled the end of Rome's golden age. In the decades and centuries that followed, troubles engulfed the empire. Roman Britain's distance from these affairs shielded it from some of them while others would have their origins in Britain. In the end, Britain would be one of the first areas of the empire to suffer from its collapse.

30:52 The assassination of the emperor comeus in 192 led to a brief period of chaos and fighting in which five men claimed the imperial throne. One of these contenders was Claius Albinus, governor of Bratana. Albinus revealed a major strategic flaw with Roman Britain as a frontier province bordering and containing potentially hostile peoples. Britannia always had a large military presence of three legions on the island under the command of the governor. But when Albinus took these men from Britain to the continent to make his bid for the throne, Britain was left undefended. The peoples to the north noticed and the new governor was forced to pay them off while Albinus was away. This held them off only briefly before they returned and ran a mock in Britain, raiding and pillaging. In 208, Emperor Septimius Seis arrived to not only bring stability to Britain, but to invade the lands north of the wall as well. No territory

31:46 was claimed, and peace soon followed. To attempt to prevent this situation from happening again, Seis decided to split the province of Bratana into two in order to reduce the power of the governor. Bratana superior encompassing Wales and southern England and Bratana inferior encompassing much of central and northern England. The 3rd century would be dominated by the 50-year long crisis in the middle of it. This began in 235 AD when the emperor Seis Alexander was murdered by the military. For the next 50 years, accession to the imperial throne was often a matter of usurping it through rebellion. This period would see 26 individuals confirmed as emperors of part of or the whole of the empire with another 25 or so who claimed it. As civil wars raged, Germanic barbarians and the assassined Persians seized the opportunity and invaded the empire. Britain fared better than much of the empire through this

32:40 period, but was not entirely spared this chaos. Raiders taking advantage of Rome's distraction would also pounce on Britain. These raiders included not only Picts but the Gales of Ireland and Germanic peoples, namely a people called the Saxons. These were the same Saxons whose descendants would one day play a much more prominent role in the history of Britain, though that era was still almost two centuries away. In response to these raids, the Romans began constructing a series of fortifications along the southern coast of Britain, which would come to be known as the Saxon Shore. In 259, Britain was briefly ejected from the empire when the Roman general Posumus led Gaul, Hispa, and Britain out of the empire into a breakaway state. Historians call the GIC Empire. The GIC Empire was not an empire of the Celtic Gauls declaring their independence from Rome, but of Roman separatists centered in Gaul. Britain

33:34 was connected to Rome via Gaul and was therefore essentially obligated to take Poshmus' side. The GIC Empire and Britain along with it was brought back into the main empire by the great emperor Aurelian in 274 following the battle of Shalon without even having to step foot in Britain. The crisis continued after Aurelian's death however until 284 when Diolesian became emperor. Diolesian who would reign until 305 alongside the co-emperors of his tetrarchy system brought stability back to the empire through a number of administrative, economic and military reforms. In 286, however, a Roman naval commander stationed in Britain named Carousius revolted. He had been accused of treason during the Saxon raids and sentenced to death, but before he could be apprehended, decided to declare himself emperor of Britannia and northern Gaul. Exploiting British frustration with the empire, he may have been popular, but he was assassinated by

34:30 a subordinate in 293, and his splinter empire was fully reabsorbed into the main empire by 296. The first half of the 4th century was very much the eye of the hurricane and Rome's decline. A period of relative peace, stability, and even prosperity across the empire in between two periods of chaos and collapse. This was felt in Britain as much as it was elsewhere. In 312, consistent with many of the reforms across the empire, Roman Britain was divided into four provinces, the exact borders of which are unknown. That same year, the emperor Constantine, the same who later ruled over the whole of the empire and is remembered as Constantine the Great, embraced Christianity following his momentous victory at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge. Though he did not make it the official religion of the empire, most of the empire would gradually follow suit with Christianity becoming the majority religion in the

35:23 empire that century, including in Britain, replacing the Celtic and Roman pagan religions here. Though the exact religious situation in Britain at the time and especially in the centuries that followed is poorly understood. In the following century however Romano British Christians like the heretic Pelagius and the esteemed missionary St. Patrick would play significant roles in the history of early Christianity. The relative tranquility in the empire did not long outlast the emperor Constantine's death in 337. usurpations, civil wars, barbarian invasions, and other such chaos not only resumed but intensified. As these conflicts often led to distant Britain's troops being taken to the continent, the empire found itself decreasingly able to defend Britain from raids conducted by Irish, Pictish, and Germanic raiders. In 367, in what the Romans called the Great Conspiracy, the island was embroiled in

36:20 chaos as all three of these groups assaulted Roman territory at once. Shortly after local Roman forces stationed along Hadrien's wall mutinied, the Romans under Count Theodosius the Elder restored order by the following year, but only briefly. The raids would soon resume. The Britain now had to learn to defend themselves. It became clear that the Romans were losing control of Britain. The Romans gradually awarded greater autonomy to local British nobles to administrate and defend their lands. In 407, Constantine III took the remaining forces in Britain to the continent in another reckless attempt to become emperor. In 410, the Romano Britain wrote to the Western Emperor Henorius requesting aid.

37:04 Henorius occupied with the barbarian all Alaric replied that they would have to see to their own defense. Thus 410 AD is regarded as the year in which Roman rule over Britain came to an end. Henorius's response to Britain was not intended as a permanent farewell. It's hard to know exactly how the Britain received it. On the one hand, they expelled Roman magistrates from their cities around this time, seemingly frustrated with Rome's impotence and believing they had abandoned them. But on the other, they seemed to have still viewed the emperor as their protector and would try to call on him to defend them again multiple times. As Se War and Hollister pointed out, a few of these earlier calls may have actually been successful. The last organized campaign in Britain on record was led by Stilico in the 390s, but Roman forces may very well have returned a few times to fight the picss, Irish gales, and Germanic tribes in a few

37:59 unrecorded events after this. But the empire, the western half of which was doomed to collapse within the century, had predominantly abandoned Britain by this point. It seems that by the 440s, further calls for aid, referred to as the groans of the Britain, were being ignored by Rome, who could do nothing for them. This era was one in which written records are rare, a problem that would only get worse in the subsequent centuries. However, from what we can tell, it appears that by 410, Roman Britain had already become a shell of its former self and only continued deteriorating. Once a relatively tranquil, prosperous country province on the edge of the empire which enjoyed many of the advancements of Roman civilization, it was now a land embroiled in violence, chaos, and destruction. As Britain had always been a quiet part of the empire off the side, it had at one time avoided many of its

38:52 troubles. But for these same reasons, it had been one of the first to be abandoned and to enter the Middle Ages when things at the heart of Rome became so bad that the empire was forced to abandon its appendages. The population seems to have begun to decline, perhaps declining by as much as half in the coming centuries due in part to factors such as the 6th century plague of Justinian. People lived among the Roman ruins while some towns and cities were abandoned altogether. Various warlords took control of the land, attempting to provide some stability to their people.

39:25 Though it seems they had only limited success. As raiders wreaked havoc across the land, the Romano Britain, specifically as the story goes, a warlord from the south named Vortigern would, in their desperation, turn to others for protection. These were hardy warlike peoples from modern-day Germany, Denmark, and the lands, collectively known as the Anglo-Saxons. These Anglo-Saxons, however, would leave much more of a mark on Britain than Vortigern seems to have intended. In our next video, we will discuss not only life in Britain after Rome, but the full history of the society these Anglo-Saxons would create there, or in other words, the history of Anglo-Saxon England. For now, however, if you want to explore this topic further, you may be interested in the video released prior to this one, what happened to Britain's romance language, the link to which can be found in the description.

40:21 We hope you enjoyed this video. If so, we invite you to come check out the rest of Fire of Learning, and to subscribe to see more videos like this in the future. To support the channel, there is also a link to our Patreon in the description. A special thanks to our current supporters listed here. This video was made without the use of AI. This has been a history of nations and peoples documentary. Graatioas tibiago for watching.

Questions about this episode

What is discussed in "Full History of Roman Britain - Documentary"?

In order: 0:00 Roman Britain, Fire of Learning, Ptheus of Misalia; 10:00 Claudius; 15:00 Buudaca, Claudius; 20:00 Roman Britain, Agricola, Hadrien, Buudaca; 25:00 Roman Britain; 30:00 Roman Britain; 35:00 Anglo-Saxon, Constantine the Great, Hadrien, Pelagius; 40:00 Fire of Learning.

What is mentioned in this Fire of Learning episode?

11 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Roman Britain, Claudius, Buudaca, Hadrien, Fire of Learning, Agricola. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Full History of Roman Britain - Documentary"?

The episode runs 41 min; the transcript is about 6,913 words in 49 timestamped sections.

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