King Arthur's Britain on BBC 2 tonight

[aligern]

I have my doubts about the heat highland/ lowland division that was shown. It ignores the story of the A/S arrival. The A/S arrive largely on the East coast and set up colonies in the fifth century. The Britons appeal to Rome and  get no help. They use foederati  and there is a rebellion, that might involve attacks across the country and the fleeing to the West of Britain and Gaul of the more sophisticated and Christian groups from the East of England and the collapse of May towns . I should point out to those who believe in a Latinate Lowland Britain that the emigrants to Brittany appear to have brought a Celtic British language .  The Britons fight back and the country is then a patchwork of statelets, Essex as a kingdom? Two Northumbrian kingdoms? Lindsey? Elmet? These are tiny. At around this time frontiers are defined and defended  by dukes, often quite imposing. Storr shows quite well how the dikes move forward as the Anglo Saxons push back the Britons in areas such as Yorkshire and Cambridge. Meanwhile the settlement pattern in what is to become Mercia is chaotic with lots of small units. One means of describing the level of A/S replacement is those areas that maintain British, ie Celtic place and river names...a bit strange if it's a Latinate population. The A/S then push across to take the Cheshire/ Cumbria area , well across the highland line. It would be fair to say that the area that the A/S do not take is less about the quality of resistance, than the quality of the land. They do not appear to have a model of taking over and running the Roman landscape, but of  settling with their own farming model, creating ham ing and ton ending settlements and not ruling an running the villa economy and crucially not being Christians.
In terms of Latin words crossing into English , as I recall through the mists of time the loan words are from Christianity and represent concepts that the religion had that did not exist in the old German world, or are likely to be Latin terms absorbed before the A/S were in England. Of course it would be most interesting if borrowings from Latin from a pre conversion contact in Britain were found as that would tell us something  about Rpman Britain. So one would love to see such evidence.
Roy

[Duncan Head]

I should point out to those who believe in a Latinate Lowland Britain that the emigrants to Brittany appear to have brought a Celtic British language .

But they appear to have come mostly from the south-west, Devon and Cornwall, which isn't what I think of as the "lowland zone" anyway.

[Patrick Waterson]

Does anyone know just how far down the British social tree Latin was the primary language?

My impression of Roman Britain, right or wrong, is that everyone who was anyone could speak Latin and hold their own in literary allusions at dinner parties, but would conduct local business in their local language.  Was this actually the case?

[Erpingham]

Yorkshire is also highland zone.  We also know the fenland remained British - as in Celtic speaking - very late. The latinate model doesn't solve the problems entirely, just differently.  But the evidence for a network of Celtic kingdoms in the East is no better than polities descended from civitates.  I don't thinkthe river names argument helps much. The Romans seem to have used versions of the Celtic names (perhaps to avoid upsetting the genii loci) and the A/S invaders carried on.  They also used Latin names for places in some form or another in many places.  Use of Ceaster and wic in names both seem to be latin loan words.


I must admit I don't have a strong view on all of this.  But models I remember from my younger days both of huges massacres of peace-loving lowlanders or the re-establishment ofCeltic kingdoms based on the pre-Roman kingdoms which had somehow survived underground seems less likely these days.

[Erpingham]

My impression of Roman Britain, right or wrong, is that everyone who was anyone could speak Latin and hold their own in literary allusions at dinner parties, but would conduct local business in their local language.  Was this actually the case?

I don't know the answer but would counter with a question of why would we think this?  Latin displaces native languages in other parts of the Western Empire, so may have done so here.  We do have graffiti evidence of lower class latin use in towns I think. But I don't think we can be firm on the subject either way.

[Jim Webster]

Does anyone know just how far down the British social tree Latin was the primary language?

My impression of Roman Britain, right or wrong, is that everyone who was anyone could speak Latin and hold their own in literary allusions at dinner parties, but would conduct local business in their local language.  Was this actually the case?

https://www.academia.edu/1191199/Literacy_in_Roman_Britain_the_epigraphical_evidence  might interest you
I know that there's a lot of poor quality latin used in curse tablets and in graffiti on pottery and roof tiles

[aligern]

But I would still maintain that even if the rural poor did speak poor Latin it has not transferred into English. I would expect baby words or some agricultural terms to make the leap.. but it appears not to and those Celtic areas of upland or forest that do survive use things like Celtic counting systems.
Roy

[Patrick Waterson]

https://www.academia.edu/1191199/Literacy_in_Roman_Britain_the_epigraphical_evidence  might interest you
I know that there's a lot of poor quality latin used in curse tablets and in graffiti on pottery and roof tiles

Interesting; thanks, Jim.  I had not realised there was so much of it about.

But I would still maintain that even if the rural poor did speak poor Latin it has not transferred into English.

I do not know enough to be sure on this point, but am inclined to agree.  Our live animals and food crops seem to be unabashedly un-Latin, as are our traditional measures of land, quantity etc.  The occasional four-letter word with Latin roots is traceable, but the basic rural vocabulary appears to be substantially Latin-free.

[Imperial Dave]

one thing to remember is that the highland/celtic zones for want of a better word had closer access to the written word (ie the church) and a more intact elite which could reinforce the dominate language present. In the lowland/proto Enlgish zones, the elites have gone/been killed potentially leaving a pagan vacuum with illiterate peasantry and A-S incomers/ex foederati. Lack of writing/reading could lead to the erosion of the previously dominant language be that british or latin. Also we are assuming that the lowland peasants all spoke latin or that they ONLY spoke latin. We should not assume that people (even lower peasantry) could only speak one language. I suspect most people were at least bilingual (reference modern day NW Wales for instance) for necessity. If many foederati and regular soldiers were germanic and for several centuries then its possible the use of a generic germanic language for every day use was quite widespread

[Jim Webster]

https://www.academia.edu/1191199/Literacy_in_Roman_Britain_the_epigraphical_evidence  might interest you
I know that there's a lot of poor quality latin used in curse tablets and in graffiti on pottery and roof tiles

Interesting; thanks, Jim.  I had not realised there was so much of it about.

It's quite amazing how much there is!

Jim

[Jim Webster]

one thing to remember is that the highland/celtic zones for want of a better word had closer access to the written word (ie the church) and a more intact elite which could reinforce the dominate language present. In the lowland/proto Enlgish zones, the elites have gone/been killed potentially leaving a pagan vacuum with illiterate peasantry and A-S incomers/ex foederati. Lack of writing/reading could lead to the erosion of the previously dominant language be that british or latin. Also we are assuming that the lowland peasants all spoke latin or that they ONLY spoke latin. We should not assume that people (even lower peasantry) could only speak one language. I suspect most people were at least bilingual (reference modern day NW Wales for instance) for necessity. If many foederati and regular soldiers were germanic and for several centuries then its possible the use of a generic germanic language for every day use was quite widespread

Have we any idea just how many Laeti had been settled in Roman Britain, probably in the lowland zone? It's perfectly possible that some areas were using german dialects 'at home' in the 4th century

[Imperial Dave]

absolutely Jim and I read a proposal somewhere (cant remember for the moment where ... d'oh) that at least one A-S dialect was a kind of Britain specific 'pidgeon' language adopted by many groups as a common language to use

[Jim Webster]

absolutely Jim and I read a proposal somewhere (cant remember for the moment where ... d'oh) that at least one A-S dialect was a kind of Britain specific 'pidgeon' language adopted by many groups as a common language to use

How celtic was the language spoken in Roman Britain anyway?

Hardly definitive but an interesting round up of ideas
http://www.proto-english.org/l4.html

[Imperial Dave]

thanks Jim, very interesting site and although not the one I was thinking of it does also speak of common language adoption for many dialects of an established language (in this case proto English)

just spent the last hour reading through the site

[Darthvegeta800]

The topic is a mess. The last 2-3 years I've been (re)reading more and more on the topic becoming more and more interested in this specific period.
Dancing away from my main loves... Rome, Greece, Napoleonics and Late Middle Ages. I found it a fascinating period both in general and specifically for a future wargaming project.
It is however a clusterfuck. And reading can be fascinating but also aggrevatingly dry and repetitive. And that's coming from an historian by education.
The way each author tries to give his own spin on very very meagre sources and info to work with...

There is a lot of thrash out there. (ex. Look the names are similar... I found Camelot!!!)
There are a lot of unnuanced but very useful general works.
And there seem to be only a few main positions in the debate.

Arthur is a myth vs Arthur is a fact vs Arthus is a partial myth.
The written worth is all vs archaeology is all vs both are useful.

And added you have both historiographical conservatism vs progressivism.
Frankly I tend to side with the conservatism usually. Recent times have had an annoying habit of trying to turn the interpretation of history a bit too 'PC'.
A bit too 'we all got along' and 'not much sign of conflict'.
The Sub Roman / Romano British / Age of Tyrants era is just another example of it.

HOWEVER... I do agree that overall traditional historiography can be a bit too cynical. Most likely there was conflict AND peaceful migration.
But mass migration + importing of mercenaries on a grand scale will never be a clean conflictless process. Writers trying to sell that are naive in my eyes.
Heck we still can't handle mass migration without conflict now...

And the decent works have theorized Arthur being everything from an amalgation to a Roman Cavalry Commander, a magistrate, a king, a warlord, etc etc.
And I doubt we'll ever know much more.

...I wish people were more honest about that. But too many authors and shows seem to push the 'we found the truth' narrative.
On the other hand I do like an author who clearly underlines based on the info beforehand these are the scenarios I envisage as likely. (but never certain)