Encyclopaedia Britannica > Volume 21, ROT-Siam

471
SCOTLAND
PART I.—HISTORY.
1. Roman Period.—The first certain lines of the history
of Scotland were written by the Romans. Their account
of its partial conquest and occupation for more than
three hundred years gives the earliest facts to which
grico- fixed dates can be assigned. The. invasion commenced
’s cam- by Julius Cassar reached in Agricola’s last campaign
[hgns. punts never afterwards exceeded. It was in the last year
of Vespasian’s life that Julius Agricola, the ablest general
bred in his camp, came to command the army in Britain.
Landing in midsummer 78, he at once commenced a cam¬
paign against Wales. In his second campaign he passed
the Solway and, defeating the tribes of Galloway, introduced
rudiments of Roman civilization in the district where Ninian
taught the rudiments of Christianity three centuries later.
This was the first conquest within modern Scotland. Two
main roads, of which traces can still be seen, mark
his advance: the western, from Carlisle through Dumfries
and Lanark, extends across the Clyde to Camelon on the
Carron; and the eastern, from Bremenium (High Rie-
chester) in Northumberland, passes through Roxburgh
and Lothian to the Forth at Cramond. Next year Agri¬
cola subdued unknown tribes, reached the estuary of the
Tay, and occupied camps at various points of central
Scotland, in the future shires of Stirling and Perth.
Traces of them are still visible at Bochastle near Callander,
Dalginross near Comrie, Fendoch on the Almond, Inver-
almond at the junction of the Almond with the Tay near
Perth, Ardargie on the north of the Ochils, and the great
camp at Ardoch south of Crieff. The fourth year of his
command was devoted to the construction of a line of forts
between the Forth and the Clyde. This barrier, strength¬
ened by a wall in the reign of Antoninus Pius, guarded
the conquests already made against the Caledonians—the
general Latin name of the northern tribes of the forests
and mountains, the Highlanders of later times—and, in
connexion with camps already occupied in the lowlands of
Perthshire, formed the base for further operations. In
the fifth year Agricola crossed the Clyde, and, without
making any permanent conquest on the western mainland,
viewed from Cantyre the coast of Ireland. Statements
by one of its chiefs as to the character and factions of that
country, whose ports were already known to Roman mer¬
chants, led to the opinion communicated to Tacitus by
Agricola, that with a single legion and a few auxiliaries
he could reduce it to subjection. The number of legions
in the Roman army of Britain was fixed at five, besides
auxiliaries and cavalry,—a total of perhaps 50,000 men.
The resistance of northern Britain explains why the easier
conquest was not undertaken. A year was required to
explore the estuaries of the Forth and the Tay with the
fleet. The absence of camps indicates that no attempt
was made to conquer the peninsula of Fife, perhaps a
separate kingdom; and Agricola prepared, to advance
against the Caledonians. Two years’ fighting, although
Tacitus chronicles only an assault on the advanced camp of
the IXth legion (at Lintrose (1) near Coupar Angus), passed
before the final engagement known in history as the battle
of the Grampians (84). It was probably fought in the hilly
country of the Stormont near Blairgowrie, the Celts descend¬
ing from strongholds in the lowest spurs of the Grampians
and attacking the Romans, whose camp lay near the junc¬
tion of the Isla and the Tay. It decided that the Roman
conquest was to stop at the Tay. Galgacus, the Caledonian
leader, was, according to the Roman historian, defeated,
but in the following winter Agricola retreated to the
camps between the Forth and the Clyde, while the fleet 78-120.
was sent round Britain. Starting probably from the
Forth and rounding the northern capes, it returned after
establishing the fact, already suspected, and of so much
consequence in future history, that Britain was an island,
planting during its progress the Roman standard on the
Orkneys, which had for several centuries been known by-
report, and sighting Shetland, the Thule of earlier navi¬
gators. Agricola, with one legion—probably the IXth,
which had suffered most—was now recalled by Domitian.
The absence of any notice of Britain for twenty years
implies the cessation of further advances,—a change of
policy due to the reverses in the Dacian War and the
financial condition of the empire.
The indefatigable Hadrian came to Britain (120) with Ha- ^
the Vlth legion, named Victrix, which replaced the IXth.
He began, and his favourite general Aulus Plautorius
Nepos completed, between the mouth of the Tyne near
Newcastle and the Solway near Carlisle, the great wall
of stone (see Hadrian, Wall of), about 80 miles in
length, 16 feet high, and 8 feet thick, protected on
the north by a trench 34 feet wide and 9 deep, with
two parallel earthen ramparts and a trench on the south,.—
proving the line required defence on both sides. Massive
fragments of the wall, its stations, castles, and protecting
camps, with the foundation of a bridge over the North
Tyne, may be still seen. It was garrisoned, by the Vlth
legion, and by the Xlth and XXth, which remained
throughout the whole Roman occupation. The conquests
of Agricola in what is modern Scotland were for a time
abandoned. Hadrian’s wall was the symbol of the strength
of Rome, and also of the valour of the northern Britons.
There must have been a stubborn resistance to. induce, the
conquerors of the world to set a limit to their province,
though the roads through the wall showed they did not
intend this limit to be permanent. The first step had
been taken. The country between the Tyne and Solway
and the Forth and Clyde, including the southern Lowlands
of Scotland, was now within the scope of Roman history, if
not yet of Roman civilization. The country north of the last
two rivers remained barbarous and unknown under its Celtic
chiefs. Hadrian had thus resumed the task of Agricola,
in one of the rapid campaigns by which he consolidated
the empire through visits to its most distant parts; but it
is doubtful whether he passed beyond the wall, which
continued to separate the Romans from the barbarians.
In the reign of his successor, Antoninus Pius, Lollius
Urbicus recovered the country from the wall of Hadrian
to the forts of Agricola, and built an earthen rampart
about half the length of the southern wall, 20 feet high
and 24 thick, protected on the north by a trench 40 feet
wide and 20 deep. It was known later as Grim or
Graham’s dyke. Remains may yet be seen between
Carriden near Borrowstounness on the Forth and West
Kilpatrick on the Clyde, with forts either then or sub¬
sequently erected at intermediate stations, connected by a
military road on the south of the wall. j
About this period Ptolemy composed the first geography of the Ptolemy s
world, illustrated by maps—probably constructed somewhat later geography,
—of Ireland and Britain, still called Albion.1 South of modern
Scotland the plan and description of the distances are generally
accurate, but north of the Solway (Itunse vEstuarium) and the
Wear (? Vedra) the island is figured as lying west and east instead
1 His information must have come from Roman officers, who, we
know, studied this branch of the military art, as maps have been
found painted on the porticos of their villas.