British History by Credo Reference: Ancient History

From Dictionary of British History
A prehistoric people of Britain. The Celts, who used iron instruments and weapons, occupied extensive areas of central and western Europe, including the British Isles.

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Ancient Celtic alphabet of one of the Irish runic languages. It was used by the druids and abandoned after the first few centuries of the Christian era.

From Cassell's Peoples, Nations and Cultures
Ancient Bitons who inhabited present-day north Wales. Their name is thought to mean ‘hammer warriors’. The Ordovices put up stiff resistance to the Romans for nearly 20 years until they were finally pacified by Agricola in AD 78.

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Ancient inhabitants of central and N Scotland, of uncertain origin. First mentioned (A.D. 297) by the Roman writer Eumenius as northern invaders of Roman Britain, they were probably descendants of late Bronze Age and early Iron Age invaders of Britain.

From Reader's Guide to British History
Alfred the Great, king of Wessex from 871 to 899, is the most celebrated of all Anglo-Saxon rulers. His reign coincided with Danish raiding and later settlement of England, but by a combination of military reforms and shrewd diplomacy, he was able to defend Wessex from the Vikings and save England from being completely overrun by them.

Name given to the Germanic-speaking peoples who settled in England after the decline of Roman rule there. They were first invited by the Celtic King Vortigern, who needed help fighting the Picts and Scots.

Generally agreed to be the finest example of OLD ENGLISH literature, Beowulf, a poem of 3,182 lines, survives in a single manuscript.

From Continuum Encyclopedia of British Literature
Cædmon is widely regarded as the first English poet, and “Cædmon’s Hymn” or the “Hymn of Creation” is the earliest surviving example of Anglo-Saxon vernacular verse. Most of what is known of Cædmon comes from the religious historian BEDE, in his Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum.

From Continuum Encyclopedia of British Literature
Cynewulf, an Anglo-Saxon poet writing sometime during the 8th-9th cs., created a unique fusion of Christian religious themes and the oral-formulaic style of OLD ENGLISH poetry in his Fates of the Apostles, Ascension, Juliana, and Elene.

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
Originally the body of law that prevailed in the part of England occupied by the Danes after the treaty of King Alfred with Guthrum in 886.

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
name traditionally applied to the kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England in the period prior to the Danish conquests of the 9th century.

From The Routledge Companion to British History
Jutes, a Germanic people speaking a language akin to Frisian, inhabited Schleswig and were perhaps northern neighbours of the Angles, with whom they (or some of them) and the Saxons invaded Britain in the 5th cent.

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
One of the kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England, consisting generally of the region of the Midlands. It was settled by Angles c.500, probably first along the Trent valley.

From Chambers Dictionary of the Unexplained
A set of letters forming an ancient Germanic or Anglo-Saxon alphabet, in use from around the 2nd century ad to the end of the Middle Ages for writing, magic and divination; a set of tiles or stones inscribed with runes, used for divination.

From Brewer's Britain and Ireland
The contents of an Anglo-Saxon ship burial of the early 7th century (possibly the tomb of Rædwald, king of the East Angles), discovered beneath a mound near Sutton Hoo in 1939. It is one of the richest ever such finds.

One of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in England. It may have been settled as early as 495 by Saxons under Cerdic, who is reputed to have landed in Hampshire.

From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia
Joint attack in AD 367 on Roman Britain from the north by Picts, Scots and Attacotti, and from Continental Europe by Franks and Saxons.

From Dictionary of British History
Queen of the Iceni, who led a revolt against the Romans (61). Prasutagas, her husband, left his kingdom jointly to his daughters and the emperor, but this did not prevent Roman agents from seizing the kingdom.

From The Routledge Companion to British History
This large British tribe occupied most of northern England except Humberside. At the coming of the Romans it was much divided by factions led by members of the royal family, some of whom intrigued with outside powers.

In Reader's Guide to British History
Although all written evidence of British tribes derives from the Roman perspective of their conquerors, literary sources augmented by archaeological evidence provide extensive information on the island's native peoples.

From Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
The Roman name for Scotland but now used only in poetry and in a few commercial or geographical connections, such as the Caledonian Hotel or the Caledonian Canal.

From The Columbia encyclopedia
(kär´´tĭmăn'jəwə), fl. 1st cent. A.D., British queen of the Brigantes. Ruler of the largest and most powerful tribe in Roman Britain (inhabiting the area that is now Yorkshire), she surrendered Caractacus to the Romans (A.D. 51). The Romans supported her rule as a client-queen in order to stabilize the region and quell dynastic conflicts.

From The Routledge Companion to British History
A powerful Belgic tribe which migrated to Britain in about 120 B.C. Its capital was at Wheathampstead (Herts) at the time of Caesar's invasions (55-4 B.C.) when its King was Cassivelaunus; he was followed by Tasciovanus, who in or about A.D. 5 was succeeded by Cunobelinus ('Cymbeline').

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
A.D. 76-138, Roman emperor (117-138), b. Spain. His name in full was Publius Aelius Hadrianus.

Line of fortifications built by the Roman emperor Hadrian across northern Britain from the Cumbrian coast on the west to the North Sea on the east.

From The Routledge Companion to British History
A wealthy British tribe inhabiting Norfolk and Suffolk at the time of the Roman Conquest. Their chief town was Caister-by-Norwich.

Roman general and dictator, considered Rome's most successful military commander.

In Architectural Excellence: 500 Iconic Buildings
Bath is the site of Britain's only geothermal spring and, as such, it was a place of worship from the earliest times.

In Dictionary of British History
The Romans first came to Britain in 55 and 54 bc, when Julius Caesar made two inconclusive raids.

From The Welsh Academy Encyclopaedia of Wales
The Iron Age tribe of south-east Wales, the Silures provided the most implacable resistance to Roman expansion of any of the British tribes.

Romano-British town near St Albans, Hertfordshire, occupied until about AD 450. Verulamium superseded a nearby Belgic settlement and was first occupied by the Romans in 44-43 BC.

Latin name Titus Flavius Sabinus Vespasianus. 9-79 AD, Roman emperor (69-79), who consolidated Roman rule, especially in Britain and Germany.