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The Ethnology of the British Colonies and Dependencies

Note 5 — Chapter I

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The original passage is as follows:—"Βριττίαν δὲ τὴν νῆσον ἔθνη τρία πολυανθρωπότατα ἔχουσι, βασιλεύς τε εἷς αὐτῶν ἑκάστῳ ἐφέστηκεν, ὀνόματα δὲ κεῖται τοῖς ἔθνεσι τούτοις Ἀγγίλοι τε καὶ Φρίσσονες καὶ οἱ τῆ νήσῳ ὁμώνυμοι Βρίττωνες. Τοσαύτη δὲ ἡ τῶνδε τῶν ἐθνῶν πολυανθρωπία φαίνεται οὖσα ὥστε ἀνὰ πᾶν ἔτος κατὰ πολλοὺς ἐνθένδε μετανιστάμενοι ξὺν γυναιξὶ καὶ παισὶν ἐς Φράγγους χώρουσιν."—Procop. B. G. iv. 20.

Reasons which have induced me to go farther than any previous writer in respect to the importance of the Frisian element in the Anglo-Saxon invasion, and to believe that instead of Saxon being a native German name for any portion of the Germanic population, it was only a Celtic and Roman term for the Germans of the sea-coast, and (amongst these) for the Frisians most especially, are given, at large, in my ethnological edition of the "Germania of Tacitus."

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