History of the Fylde of LancashirePorter, John (Writer on the Fylde of Lancashire)
History
History of the Fylde of Lancashire
Porter, John (Writer on the Fylde of Lancashire)
Lancashire (England) -- History
The hardihood of the native Britons of these parts is attested by Dion
Cassius, who informs us that they lived on prey, hunting, and the fruits
of trees, and were accustomed to brave hunger, cold, and all kinds of
toil, for they would “continue several days up to their chins in water,
and bear hunger many days.” In the woods their habitations were wicker
shelters, formed of the branches of trees interwoven together, and, in
the open grounds, clay or mud huts. They were indebted to the skins of
animals slain in the chase for such scanty covering as they cared to
wear, and according to Cæsar and other writers, dyed their bodies with
woad, which produced a blue colour, and had long flowing hair, being
cleanly shaved except the head and upper lip. That the power of endurance
possessed by the Setantii, and the neighbouring Brigantes is not to be
understood literally as expressed by Cassius may, we venture to think,
be taken for granted. It can scarcely be credited that the human frame
could ever be reduced or exalted to such an amphibious condition as to
be indifferent whether it passed a number of days on dry land or under
water; it seems more probable that in his description Cassius referred
to the hunting and other expeditions of the inhabitants into the forests
and morasses of the Fylde and similarly wooded and marshy tracts, where
there is no question the followers of the chase would be more or less in
a state of immersion during the whole time they were so engaged.
The religion of the Setantii was Druidical, and their deities resembled
those of other heathen nations, such as the Romans and Greeks of that
era, but differed in their names. Cæsar tells us that this order of
priesthood was presided over by a superior, who was known as the chief
Druid, and had almost unlimited authority over all the rest. The Druids
were settled at various points of the island, where they erected their
temples, but in addition to these principle stations, many of their order
were scattered amongst the native tribes of Britain, over which they
appear to have exercised the functions and power of judges, arranging
both public and private disputes, and deciding all criminal cases. It
was part of the creed professed by the Setantii, to vow, when they were
engaged in warfare, that they would, through the agency of the Druids,
immolate human victims as an atonement for slaughtered enemies, believing
that unless man’s life were given for man’s life, the divine anger of
the immortal Gods could not be appeased. There were other sacrifices of
the same kind instituted at regularly appointed seasons and on special
occasions. The Setantii also believed in an immortal soul, but seem to
have had no idea of a higher state, as their priests inculcated the
doctrine that after death the soul was transported to another body,
“imagining that by this the men were more effectually roused to valour,
the fear of death being taken away.”[3] Ornaments called “Druids’ eggs,”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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