Note 2887 — PORTUS ITIUS
Reading edition
Nat. Hist., iv, 23 (37), § 122. Wauters (Bull. de l’Acad. Roy ... de Belgique, 2e sér., xlvii, 1879, pp. 125-6) actually argues that because Lambert of Ardres, who wrote in the thirteenth century, called Wissant the portus Britannicus, therefore Wissant was the portus Morinorum Britannicus of Pliny! He forgets that Lambert was not referring to the time of the Roman Empire: he simply meant that in his own time Wissant was a frequented port of departure for England.
Courtois insists (Bull. de la Soc. des ant. de la Morinie, iii, 1862, p. 391) that Pliny distinguishes the portus Morinorum Britannicus from Gesoriacum. As well might a modern leader-writer be said to distinguish London from ‘the metropolis’.