Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of York: A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Archi-Episcopal SeeClutton-Brock, A. (Arthur)
History
Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of York: A Description of Its Fabric and A Brief History of the Archi-Episcopal See
Clutton-Brock, A. (Arthur)
York Minster
At York the city did not grow up round the cathedral as at Ely or
Lincoln, for York, like Rome or Athens, is an immemorial--a
prehistoric--city; though like them it has legends of its foundation.
Geoffrey of Monmouth, whose knowledge of Britain before the Roman
occupation is not shared by our modern historians, gives the following
account of its beginning:--"Ebraucus, son of Mempricius, the third king
from Brute, did build a city north of Humber, which from his own name,
he called Kaer Ebrauc--that is, the City of Ebraucus--about the time
that David ruled in Judea." Thus, by tradition, as both Romulus and
Ebraucus were descended from Priam, Rome and York are sister cities; and
York is the older of the two. One can understand the eagerness of Drake,
the historian of York, to believe the story. According to him the verity
of Geoffrey's history has been excellently well vindicated, but in
Drake's time romance was preferred to evidence almost as easily as in
Geoffrey's, and he gives us no facts to support his belief, for the very
good reason that he has none to give.
Abandoning, therefore, the account of Geoffrey of Monmouth, we are
reduced to these facts and surmises. Before the Roman invasion the
valley of the Ouse was in the hands of a tribe called the Brigantes, who
probably had a settlement on or near the site of the present city of
York. Tools of flint and bronze and vessels of clay have been found in
the neighbourhood. The Brigantes, no doubt, waged intermittent war upon
the neighbouring tribes, and on the wolds surrounding the city are to be
found barrows and traces of fortifications to which they retired from
time to time for safety. The position of York would make it a favourable
one for a settlement. It stands at the head of a fertile and pleasant
valley and on the banks of a tidal river. Possibly there were tribal
settlements on the eastern wolds in the neighbourhood in earlier and
still more barbarous times, before the Brigantes found it safe to make a
permanent home in the valley, but this is all conjecture. It is not
until the Roman conquest of Britain that York enters into history. The
Brigantes were subdued between the years 70 and 80 A.D. by Patilius
Cerealis and Agricola. The Romans called the city by the name of
Eburacum. The derivation is not known. It has been suggested that it was
taken from the river Ure, a tributary of the Ouse, but variations of the
word are common in the Roman Empire, as, for example, Eburobriga,
Eburodunum, and the Eburovices. These are probably all derived from some
common Celtic word. In process of time, perhaps in the reign of the
Emperor Severus--that is to say, about the beginning of the third
century A.D.--the name was changed to Eboracum: from this was derived
the later British name Caer Eabhroig or Ebrauc. The Anglo-Saxon name was
Eoferwic, corrupted by the Danes into Jorvik or Yorvik, which by an easy
change was developed into the modern name of York. In the York Museum is
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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