The Cymry

The Cymry, according to Pinkerton, Michalot, and others, were Celts, who, having been expelled from their country (on the borders of Europe and Asia, about the Cimmerian Bosphorus or Palus Meotis, now the Sea of Azov), by the Scythians, settled in Northern Germany, and in the country called the Chersonesus Cimbrica, now “Jutland,” in Denmark. The Ancient Britons and Welsh are therefore considered to have been descended from the Cymry or Cimbri of Gaul and Germany; and the Welsh in their own language are called Cymry; and from the same source Wales has been called Cambria, and the people Cambrians.

The Cymry or Ancient Britons, who were settled in the north of England, were called Cumbri, and gave its name to Cumbria or Cumberland. When Cæsar invaded Britain, the southern parts of England from Suffolk to Devonshire were possessed by the Belgians of Gaul, who, many centuries before the Christian era, sent colonies to that country. The Belgæ or Belgians were chiefly Celts, and spoke a dialect of the Celtic language, mixed with the German or Teutonic tongue, which, being intermixed as they were with the Germans, they partly adopted: hence, they were by some considered to be of the Teutonic race.

The following were the chief Belgic tribes in Britain at the time of its invasion by the Romans: the Cantii, in Kent; the Trinobantes, in Essex and Middlesex; the Regini and Atrebates, in Surrey, Sussex, Hampshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire, and Somerset; the Durotriges, in Dorsetshire; and the Damnonii, in Devonshire and Cornwall. These Damnonii were no doubt of the same stock as the Firvolgians (who were called by the Irish annalists Firdomnians or Damnonians), who, in the early ages, landed in large force in Connaught, at Erris in the county of Mayo (see page 846, Vol. I.).