The Brigantines & Picts
North Yorkshire had both a Roman and Viking history as being the capital of its kings when Deira continued to have an Anglian king. Edwin of Northumbria and his daughter Acha married Æthelfrith of Bernicia. Edwin's victory over the Irish of Dál Riata holds that Deira and Bernicia were the two basic components of what would later be defined as Northumbria. Known as Kent, the land once covered at Northumbria's peak is administered now in divided parts as North East England (Anglian Bernicia), Yorkshire and the Humber (Danish Deira), North West England (Celtic Cumbria- Manchester, Lancashire, Yorkshire), the Scottish Borders, West Lothian, Edinburgh, Midlothian and East Lothian.
Colne came under Northumbrian and then Viking rule. At its greatest the kingdom extended from the Humber to the Forth. The Humber is a large tidal estuary forming part of the boundary between northern and southern England. The name Colne is of Celtic origin, for a river in Kent. It is currently thought to have been founded around the 1st to 4th centuries B.C. by the Brigantes. It was located along the Trans-Pennine ridgeway, a major trade route dating back to the Bronze Age. In 73 AD the governor Petillius Cerialis invaded, and defeated Venutius, but continued unrest led to Agricola finally annexing Brigantine territory for good in 79 AD.
Brigantine presence in Ireland (Tipperary, Waterford, Carlow, Thomond and Ossory) on certainly a second century map by Ptolemy shows the Brigantes there, and excavations on the island of Lambay show Brigantine artefacts dating from the end of the first century AD. This might indicate a settlement of Brigantines fleeing from the final Roman occupation of their tribal territories in England. Indeed the name 'Brigantes' is translated as 'The People of Brigit'. The Brigantes dominated what is now northern England, with settlements at Catterick, Aldborough, Ilkley and York. The Picts and Brigantes are two of the oldest pre-Roman inhabitants of Great Britain. Both inhabited and battled the Romans and each other for the lands of Northern England and Scotland.
The Carvetii were a people and civitas of Roman Britain living in what is now Cumbria and Lancashire in north-west England. They are not mentioned in Ptolemy's Geography or in any other classical text, and are known only from inscriptions found in Penrith and Temple Sowerby in Cumbria. Their capital is presumed to have been Luguvalium (Carlisle), the only walled town known in the region. Shortly before Julius Caesar's invasion of Britain in 55 and 54 BC, the Trinovantes were considered the most powerful tribe in Britain. At this time their capital was probably at Braughing (in modern-day Hertfordshire).
The next identifiable king of the Trinovantes, known from numismatic evidence, was Addedomarus, who took power ca. 20-15 BC, and moved the tribe's capital to Camulodunum. Addedomarus was briefly succeeded by his son Dubnovellaunus c. 10–5 BC, but a few years later the tribe was finally conquered by either Tasciovanus or his son Cunobelinus. Mandubracius, Addedomarus and Dubnovellaunus all appear in later, post-Roman and medieval British Celtic genealogies and legends as Manawydan, Aedd Mawr (Addedo the Great) and Dyfnwal Moelmut (Dubnovellaunus the Bald and Silent). The Welsh Triads recall Aedd Mawr as one of the founders of Britain. The Trinovantes reappeared in history when they participated in Boudica's revolt against the Roman Empire in 60 AD. Their name was given to one of the civitates of Roman Britain, whose chief town was Caesaromagus (modern Chelmsford, Essex). Their name survived in British legend as Trinovantum, connecting this with the legend that Britain was founded by a Roman consul Brutus of Troy and other refugees from the Trojan War who conquered Spain and Britain. After wandering among the island of the Tyrrhenian Sea and through Gaul, where Brutus founded the city of Tours. After his death the island is divided bewteen his three sons, Locrinus (England), Albanactus (Scotland) and Kamber (Wales).
Saint Denis, (Dionysius, Dennis, or Denys) is a Christian martyr saint and bishop of Paris, is the patron saint of France. He died around 250 AD. Gregory of Tours simply states of Denis that he was bishop of the Parisii. Reputed to have been sent out under the direction of Pope Fabian, after the persecutions under Emperor Decius had all but dissolved the small Christian community at Lutetia (Paris). Denis with his inseparable companions, the priest Rusticus and the deacon Eleutherius, who were martyred with him, settled on the Ile de la Cité in the Seine.
The Parisii (or Quarisii) were a Celtic Iron Age people that lived on the banks of the river Seine (in Latin, Sequana) in Gaul from the middle of the third century B.C. until the Roman era. With the Suessiones, the Parisii participated in the general rising of Vercingetorix (a chieftan of the Arverni) against Julius Caesar in 52 B.C. The Arverni were a Gallic tribe that inhabited the present-day region of Lyon, France. They gave their name to the French region of Auvergne. They had been the most powerful Gallic tribe in the 3rd and 2nd centuries B.C. under their king, Luernios, but when his son Bituitus was defeated by the Romans in 123BC and the Roman ‘Provincia’ established, their ascendancy passed to the Aedui and Sequani- a Celtic people who occupied the upper basin of the Arar (Saone), their territory corresponding to Franche-Comte and part of Burgundy. The Sequani then appealed to Caesar, who drove back the Germans (58 BC), but at the same time obliged the Sequani to surrender all that they had gained from the Aedui. This so exasperated the Sequani that they joined in the revolt of Vercingetorix (52 BC) and shared in the defeat at Alesia. Under Augustus, the district known as Sequania formed part of Belgica.
Diocletian added Helvetia, and part of Germania Superior to Sequania, which was now called Provincia Maxima Sequanorum, Vesontio receiving the title of Metropolis civitas Vesontiensium. Under Julian, it recovered some of its importance as a fortified town, and was able to withstand the attacks of the Vandals. Later, when Rome was no longer able to afford protection to the inhabitants of Gaul, the Sequani became merged in the newly formed Kingdom of Burgundy. According to Herodotus, the Sigynnae (of antiquity) dwelt beyond the Danube, and their frontiers extended almost as far as the Eneti on the Adriatic. They could indeed have been a part of the Iranian expansion, together with the Scythians and Sarmatians migrating west into the Ukraine in the early Iron Age context of the Thraco-Cimmerian migrations , as a tribe of the Black Sea steppes related to the Medes, may have invaded the area about the time of the Cimmerian expansion.
Prince Vercingetorix of the Arverni began raising his forces in Provence in the winter of 52 BC, while Caesar was in Cisalpine Gaul. This was a very decisive battle in the creation of the Roman empire. He may have been a 17-year-old teenager when he unified the Gauls against Julius Caesar's invading legions. It is also likely that he had Druidic help in planning his defense against Julius Caesar. The refusal of the Roman senate to allow Caesar the honour of a triumph for his victory in the Gallic Wars eventually led, in part, to the Roman civil war of 50–45 BC. After 30 BC, the Republic was unified under leadership of Octavian. In 27 B.C. Octavian was granted the title of Augustus by the Senate. These two dates are considered to mark the end of the Republic and the birth of the Roman Empire. The next Roman civil war would not be fought until after Nero's suicide in 68 AD, the yeare before the yeare of the four emperors.
Caesar was then camped for the winter in Cisalpine Gaul. Following their defeat some Parisii may at this time fled to Britain although it is more likely that Parisii had already colonised part of the island before this time and preceding the waves of Belgic immigration. He split his forces, sending four legions with Titus Labienus to fight the Senones and the Parisii in the North. Caesar himself set on the pursuit of Vercingetorix with six legions and his allied Germanic cavalry. Meanwhile, the Helvetii try to leave Switzerland and move into southern Gaul under the command of Orgetorix at the start of Gallic Wars. Caesar, at the time, commanded six legions comprised of nearly 29,000 men. The Helvetii, according to Caesar's writings, had 370,000 people (including children and women), but only 110,000 men-at-arms.
Alesia, the capital of the Mandubii, one of the Gaulish tribes allied with the mighty Aedui, and after Julius Caesar's conquest a Roman town (Oppidum) in Gaul. Alesia proved to be the end of generalized and organized resistance to the Roman invasion of Gaul. The country was then subdued, becoming a Roman province and was eventually subdivided into several smaller administrative divisions. The Cenimagni, who surrendered to Julius Caesar during his second expedition to Britain in 54 BC, may have been a branch of the Iceni- a Brythonic tribe who inhabited an area of Britain corresponding roughly to the modern-day county of Norfolk between the 1st century B.C. and 1st century AD. The site of the battle may have been Stonea Camp in Cambridgeshire.
A second, more serious, uprising took place in 61. Prasutagus, the wealthy, pro-Roman Icenian king, had died. His widow Boudica led the Iceni and the neighbouring Trinovantes in a large-scale revolt, destroying and looting Camulodunum (Colchester), Londinium (London) and Verulamium (St. Albans) before finally being defeated by Sutonius Paulinus and his legions. Trinovantes' territory was on the north side of the Thames estuary in current Essex and Suffolk, and included lands now located in Greater London. Their capital was Camulodunum (modern Colchester), one proposed site of the legendary Camelot. The Romano-British Parisii tribe of East Yorkshire and Humberside in Britain is traditionally seen as being comprised of emigrants from the tribe of the same name based in Gaul. The burial processes of the Gaulish and British tribes differ slightly but the Iron Age Arras Culture which settled around East Yorkshire in the early La Tène period shows distinctive continental influence.
At Gibraltar in the south, it approaches the northern coast of Africa. Pre-Roman languages were spoken in the Iberian peninsula before the Roman occupation: Lusitanian, Aquitan or Basque, Iberian, Celtiberian, and Tartessian. The original peoples of the Iberian peninsula may have included the Basques, the only pre-Celtic people in Iberia surviving to the present day as a separate ethnic group. The seafaring Phoenicians, Greeks and Carthaginians successively settled along the Mediterranean coast and founded trading colonies there over a period of several centuries. In the early 5th century, Germanic tribes invaded the peninsula, namely the Suevi, the Vandals (Silingi and Hasdingi) and their allies, the Sarmatian Alans.
Only the kingdom of the Suevi (Quadi and Marcomanni) would endure after the arrival of another wave of Germanic invaders, the Visigoths, who conquered all of the Iberian peninsula and expelled or partially integrated the Vandals and the Alans.
The Visigoths eventually conquered the Suevi kingdom and its capital city Bracara (modern day Braga) in 584-585. Alaric II succeeded his father Euric in 485 as king of the Visigoths. His dominions included not only the whole of Hispania except its north-western corner but also Aquitaine and the greater part of an as-yet undivided Gallia Narbonensis. The Frankish Caesarius, bishop of Arles, born at Châlons and appointed bishop in 503 and with the Burgundians to turn over the Arelate to Burgundy, whose king had married the sister of Clovis, so Alaric exiled him for a yeare safely at Bordeaux in Aquitaine before allowing him to return unharmed when the crisis had passed.
According to the Irish chronicler Abbot Tighernac, Fergus Mor Mac Erc, King of the Dal Riata, transferred his throne from Antrim in North Ireland across the channel in 500 AD to join other Riatans living near Loch Linnhe in Scotland. Dunadd became the capital of the Dalriadic kingdom, which came to encompass the areas of Argyll, Kintyre and the Inner Hebrides. Columba intervened and proclaimed Aedan as king over his elder brother Eoganan.. The power of Columba and his successors exercised in non-secular matters encouraged relative peace and prosperity between Dalriada and her neighbors, the Picts to the east and north, and the Britons to the south. Then came the Saxons of Berneicia and Deira, which were later joined to form Northumbria.
King Aedan lead a Dalriadic/Strathcyde Breton army against Ethelfrid of Berneicia, but was defeated decisively at Daegsastan (circa 597 AD). This defeat, coupled with the news of the death of Columba, prompted Aedan to relinquish his throne and retire to Kintyre, where he died at age 80. In 613 AD, a Dalriadic contingent fought with a unified British army (with contingents from Gwynedd, Powys, Pengwern and Dumnonian) against the Saxon invader Ethelfrid at Chester. The battle failed to slow the Saxon king, who continued his campaign and slew 1200 British monks of Bangor who where attempting to avert the battle with prayer. Ethelfrid then seized Deira from his brother Edwin, and combined them into the new Kingdom of Northumbria, which Edwin recovered in 617 AD Then King Penda of Mercia and Caedwalla (Cadwallon) of Wales joined forces against Northumbria, killing Edwin and destroying his army at the battle of Heathfield Chase in 633/634 AD. Caedwalla was given the Northumbrian throne by Penda, but lost it again to Oswald, son of Ethelfrid, who fought a series of battles with Penda to defend it. Oswald's army included a contingent of Scots (including monks from Iona) provided by King Domnall Brecc of Dalriada. With the defeat and death of Penda, Oswald and his heir Owsy reigned supreme. They seized Edinburgh, the last major stronghold of the British Votadini kingdom of Goddodin. Unable to resist, Dalriada and the Pictish kingdoms were forced to swear fealty to the Northumbrian bretwaldas.
Domnhall, king of the Ui Neill defeated Congal, king of the Dal nAraide and Ulster (the nephew and agent of King Domnall Brecc of Dalriada) at the battle of Magh Rath in 637 AD, effectively ending Dalriadic control over their Irish possessions. In 642 AD, King Owen of Strathclyde defeated an invading Dalriadic army at the Battle of Strathcarron, killing the Scottish King Domnall Brecc.
Oswy's heir Egfrid ascended to the Northumbrian throne in 670 AD and mounted campaigns in the north to consolidate his hold over the Scots and Picts. Dalriada and the Picts fought unsuccessfully for independence, the Picts suffering a massive defeat in which their dead were reputed to lie so thick in two rivers that the Northumbrians could walk dry-shod from bank to bank. Thereafter Egfrid annexed Galloway, drove the Britons entirely out of Cumbria, seized Carlisle and the famous Columban monastery at Lindisfarne, and subjected the Mercians to his rule. Egfrid's subsequent foray into Ireland was repulsed, after which he mounted a major invasion of the north in 685 AD. The Picts feigned a retreat, drawing the Northumbrians deeper into the highlands to Lin Garan (or Nechtan's Mere) a marshy lake in Forfarshire where an ambush had been laid. Egfrid was killed in the subsequent battle and his army all but annihilated, thus ending the Northumbrian control over Pictland and Dalriada and allowing the Picts to occupy as far south as Lothian. Contingents of Strathclyde Britons and Dalraidic Scots may have fought with the Picts at the battle of Nechtansmere.
In 781 AD, Constantine mac Fergus became King of the Northern Picts. Over the next ten years, he extended his rule south and west. In 798 AD, the Vikings made their first appearance on the scene and posed a constant threat to both the Picts and Dalriadic Scots for the next 200 years. In 809 or 810 AD, Conall mac Aed relinguished the throne of Dalraidia according to Irish annalists (perhaps because of the Viking threat), and the Dalriadic nobles recognized Constantine as their king, thus unifying the Picts and Scots for the first time. Constantine and his heir and brother Oengus referred to their joint kingdom as Fortren. From this point forward until the accession of Kenneth Mac Alpin, the exact line of "Scottish" kings or claimants to the former Dalriadic throne is unclear.