Читать книгу Anglo-American Cultural Studies - Jody Skinner - Страница 72

place names, roads, wallsThe RomanRoman conquestRoman conquest first provided us with written records about the inhabitants of Britain. As we’ve just seen, pre-Roman inhabitants left stone circles, hills of earth, and jewelry but no written records. Famous Romans like CaesarCaesar and Tacitus wrote about the natives. We can see other evidence just by glancing at any given [56]map of Britain and noting down the names of towns and cities like ColchesterColchester (claims to be the oldest town in Britain), ChesterChester (with its medieval city walls), GloucesterGloucester (a test of your knowledge of English pronunciation – two syllables only!), CirencesterCirencester, LancasterLancaster (we’ll come back to this place later, keep “roserose” in mind), ManchesterManchester (we’ll come back to this place later, keep sportssports in mind). The suffix caster or chester is derived from the Latin word castrum, meaning camp or fortification. The suffix also helps us to see that the Romans were pretty much everywhere in EnglandEngland and built roads to get to everywhere. Those who’d like to see remnants of one of the largest stone walls built in the whole Roman Empire just need to head north towards ScotlandScotland to Hadrian’s Wall, parts of which are still standing today more or less along the present border between England and Scotland. Hadrian’s Wall makes up the northwestern part of a UNESCOUNESCO World Heritage SiteWorld Heritage Site called Frontiers of the Roman EmpireFrontiers of the Roman Empire, which includes the Limes walls in GermanyGermany. For those who like dates, Caesar first arrived in Britain in 55 BC and the Romans left Britain in the early 6^th century AD; for those who don’t like dates, just say the Romans were in Britain for around 500 years.