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Sub-Roman Britain is a term derived from an archaeologists' label for the material culture of Britain in Late Antiquity . "Sub-Roman" was invented to describe the pottery in sites of the 5th Century and the 6th Century , initially with an inference of decay to locally-made wares from a higher standard under the Roman Empire . It is now used to denote a period of history. The period of sub-Roman Britain traditionally covers the history of Britain from the end of Roman imperial rule, in the very early fifth century, to the arrival of St Augustine in AD 597. This period has attracted a great deal of academic and popular debate, in part due to the scarcity of the source material, and in part due to this period being the time in which later national identities have found their origins The term Late Antiquity, implying wider horizons, is finding more use in the academic community, especially when features common throughout the post-Roman West are examined, while a range of more dramatic names are given to the period in popular works: The Dark Ages, The Brythonic Age, the Age of Tyrants or the Age of Arthur. SOURCES Written material There is very little written material available for this period. Only two contemporary, British sources exist. The ''Confessio'' of at the time. Gildas' ''De Excidio Britanniae'' is a jeremiad; it is written as a polemic to warn contemporary rulers against sin, demonstrating through historical and biblical examples that bad rulers are always punished by God. The historical section of ''De Excidio'' is short, and the material in it is clearly selected with Gildas' purpose in mind. There are no absolute dates given, and some of the details, such as those regarding the Hadrian and Antonine Walls are clearly wrong. Nevertheless, Gildas does provide us with an insight into some of the kingdoms that existed when he was writing, and to how an educated monk perceived the situation between the Anglo-Saxons and the British. There are more continental sources, though these are highly problematic. The most famous is the so-called ''Rescript of Honorius '', in which the Western Emperor Honorius tells the British ''civitates'' to look to their own defence. The first reference to this rescript is written by the sixth-century Byzantine scholar Zosimus and is located randomly in the middle of a discussion of southern Italy and no further mention of Britain is made, which has led some, though not all, modern academics to suggest that the rescript does not apply to Britain at all, but to Bruttium in Italy.Discussion in Martin Millett, ''The Romanization of Britain'', (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990). The Gallic Chronicle provides us with information about St Germanus and his visit(s) to Britain, though again this text has received considerable academic deconstruction.Michael Jones and John Casey, 'The Gallic Chronicle Restored: A Chronology for the Anglo-Saxon Invasions and the End of Roman Britain', ''Britannia'' 19, (1988), pp.367-98; R.W. Burgess, 'The Dark Ages Return to Fifth-Century Britain: The 'Restored' Gallic Chronicle Exploded', ''Britannia'' 21, (1990), pp.185-195 The work of Procopius, another sixth-century Byzantine writer, makes some reference to Britain, though the accuracy of these is far from certain. There are numerous later written sources that claim to provide accurate accounts of the period. The first to attempt this was the monk Bede , writing in the early eighth century. He based his account of the Sub-Roman period in his ''Ecclesiastica Historia gentis Anglorum'' heavily on Gildas, though he tried to provide dates for the events Gildas describes. Later sources, such as the history attributed to Nennius , the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and the Annales Cambriae are all heavily shrouded in myth, and can only be used as evidence for this period with the greatest caution.David Dumville, 'Sub-Roman Britain: History and Legend', ''History'' 62, (1977), pp.173-92 Archaeological evidence can provide a rough estimate, this is not accurate enough to associate archaeological finds with historical events. Dendrochronology is accurate enough to do this, though few suitable pieces of wood have been uncovered. Coins would normally prove the most useful tool for dating, though this is not the case for sub-Roman Britain as no new coins are believed to have entered circulation since the very early fifth century.A.S. Esmond Cleary, ''The Ending of Roman Britain'', (London: Batsford, 1989), pp.138-139 Linguistic and place-name evidence Linguistics is a useful way of analysing the culture of a people, and to an extent political associations, in a period.See Kenneth Jackson, ''Language and History in Early Britain: A Chronological Survey of the Brittonic Languages'', (Edinburgh, 1953) for a traditional introduction Studies into Old English , P- And Q-Celtic and Latin have provided us with evidence for contact between the British and the Anglo-Saxons, and also between the lowland British and highland British. Similarly, studies of place-names demonstrate the language of the politically and socially dominant culture. Genetic evidence Recent work analysing the y-chromosomes and mitochondrial-DNA of people now living in Britain and on the continent has provided some insight into how population movements might have occurred during the sub-Roman period. However, all such a study can ever demonstrate is genetic descent, which does not necessarily encompass political affiliation, language and culture, and may not be how an individual identifies their ethnicity.See and [http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VRT-48PV5SH-12&_coverDate=05%2F27%2F2003&_alid=339895807&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_qd=1&_cdi=6243&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000049116&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=949111&md5=9edf5ce1c39d4139af4c01733282fa82 for opposing interpretations using the genetic evidence THE END OF ROMAN BRITAIN A strong thread in the Historiography of the end of Roman Britain is an attempt to place a firm date on it. Various dates have been advanced, from the end of coinage in 402, to Constantine III 's rebellion in 407, to the rebellion mentioned by Zosimus in 409, and the infamous Rescript of Honorius in 410.See for instance E.A. Thompson, 'Britain, AD 406-410', ''Britannia'' 8, (1977), pp.303-18 and P. Bartholomew, 'Fifth-Century Facts', ''Britannia'' 13, (1982), pp.261-70 Though much ink has been spilt over trying to place a date on when the flag went down and the troops went home, it is perhaps better not to think of this in terms of modern Decolonisation . The dating of the end of Roman Britain is complex, and the exact process of it is probably unknowable. There is some controversy as to just why Roman rule ended in Britain. The view first advocated by armies led Rome to abandon Britain. It was the collapse of the imperial system that led to the end of imperial rule in Britain. However, Michael Jones has advanced an alternative thesis that argues that Rome did not leave Britain, but that Britain left Rome.Michael Jones, ''The End of Roman Britain'', esp. chapters 4 and 7 He highlights the numerous usurpers who came from Britain in the late fourth and early fifth century, and that a supply of Coinage to Britain had dried up by the early fifth century, meaning administrators and troops were not getting paid. All of this, he argues, led the British people to rebel against Rome. Both of these arguments are open to criticism, though as yet no further developments have been made in understanding why the end of Roman Britain occurred. THE ANGLO-SAXON MIGRATION The traditional view It was long held that the , but also the later sources, that cast the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons as a violent event. The place-name and linguistic evidence was also considered to support this interpretation, as very few British place-names survived in eastern Britain, and few P-Celtic words entered the Old English language. This interpretation particularly appealed to earlier English historians, who wanted to further their view that England had developed differently to Europe with a limited monarchy and love of liberty. This, it was argued, came from the mass Anglo-Saxon invasions. Though few would now utilise this argument, the traditional view is still held by some historians, Lawrence James recently writing that England was 'submerged by an Anglo-Saxon current which swept away the Romano-British.'Lawrence James, ''Warrior Race'', (London: Abacus. 2002), p.30 Recent interpretations The traditional view has now been deconstructed to a considerable extent. At the centre of this is a re-estimation of the numbers of Anglo-Saxons arriving in Britain during this period. A lower figure is now generally accepted, making it highly unlikely that the existing British population was substantially displaced by the Anglo-Saxons.Michael Jones, ''The End of Roman Britain'', pp.8-38. The place-name and linguistic evidence can be explained in that the Anglo-Saxons were politically and socially dominant in the south and east of Britain, meaning their language and Culture also became dominant. There is some archaeological evidence for Anglo-Saxons and Britons living on the same site. For example, in the cemetery at Wasperton, Warwickshire , it is possible to see one family adopting Anglo-Saxon culture over a long period.Helena Hamerow, 'The earliest Anglo-Saxon kingdoms' in ''The New Cambridge Medieval History, I, c.500-c.700''. ed. Paul Fouracre, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p.265. THE FATE OF THE ROMANO-BRITONS Intrinsic to this period is the fate of the population of Britain under Roman rule. Some clearly adopted Anglo-Saxon culture and identified themselves as Anglo-Saxons. Others may have lived in separate communities under Anglo-Saxon rule. The Laws of king Aethelberht Of Kent , probably written in the early seventh century, make reference to a legal underclass known as ''laets'' who might represent British communities. There definitely is a British (''wealh'') underclass referred to in Ine Of Wessex ’s law code, written in the late seventh or early eighth centuries. However, the violent nature of the period should not be overlooked, and it is likely that this period was a time of endemic tension, alluded to in all of the written sources. This may have led to the deaths of a substantial number of the British population. There are also references to Plague s, though these would have affected Anglo-Saxon and British populations equally. The evidence from land use suggests a slight decline in production, which might be a sign of population decline.Davey, 'The Environs of South Cadbury', p.50 It is clear that some British people migrated to the Continent , which resulted in the region of Armorica in north-west Gaul becoming known as Brittany . There is also evidence of British migration to Hispania . The dating of these migrations is uncertain, but recent studies suggest that the migration from south-western Britain to Brittany began as early as AD 300 and was largely ended by 500. These settlers, unlikely to be refugees given the early date, made their presence felt in the naming of the westernmost, Atlantic -facing provinces of Armorica, Cornouaille (" Cornwall ") and Domnonea (" Devon "). Gwenaël Le Duc, 'The Colonisation of Brittany from Britain: New Approaches and Questions' in ''Celtic Connections: proceedings of the tenth international congress of celtic studies. Volume One''. ed. Black, Gillies and Ó Maolaigh, (East Linton: Tuckwell Press, 1999), ISBN 1-89410-77-1 However, there is clear linguistic evidence for close contacts between the south-west of Britain and Brittany across the sub-Roman period.Wendy Davies, 'The Celtic kingdoms' in ''The New Cambridge Medieval History, Volume I, c.500-c.700''. ed. Paul Fouracre, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp.255-61 In Galicia , in the northwest corner of the Iberian Peninsula , another region of traditional Celtic culture, the Suevic ''Parochiale'' drawn up about 580, includes a list of the principal churches of each diocese in the metropolitanate of Braga the ''ecclesia Britonensis'', now Bretoña ; it was the seat of a bishop who ministered to the spiritual needs of the British immigrants to north-western Spain: in 572 its bishop, Mailoc, had a Celtic name.Fletcher, ''Saint James's Catapult'', ch. 1, note 61. In the west of Britain the period saw the creation of non-Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, which are first referred to in Gildas' ''De Excidio Britanniae''. To an extent these kingdoms may have derived from Roman structures.Ken Dark, ''Britain and the End of the Roman Empire'', pp.150-192 However, it is also clear that they drew on a strong influence from structure. The west of Britain in this period has attracted those who wish to place and earthworks such as the Wansdyke . It is unlikely that any firm evidence will be produced for this, however, and such interpretations may continue to attract the popular imagination and the scepticism of the majority of academics. ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE There is evidence for Climate Change in the fifth century, with conditions turning cooler and wetter. This shortened the growing season and made uplands unsuited to growing Grain . Dendrochronology reveals a particular climatic event in the year AD 540.Davey, 'The Environs of South Cadbury', p.50 Michael Jones suggests that declining agricultural production from land that was already fully exploited had considerable demographic consequences.Jones, ''The End of Roman Britain'', pp.186-243 SEE ALSO
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