True it is, I confess, that afterwards many cities and towns in Britain, under the government of the Romans, were walled with stone and baked bricks or tiles, as Richborrow or Ryptacester,[5] in the Isle of Thanet, until the channel altered his course, beside Sandwich in Kent; Verulamium,[6] beside St. Albans, in Hertfordshire; Cilcester[7] in Hampshire; Wroxcester[8] in Shropshire; Kencester[9] in Herefordshire, three miles from Hereford town; Ribcester,[10] seven miles above Preston, on the water of Rible; Aldburgh,[11] a mile from Boroughbridge, or Watling Street, on Ure river, and others; and no doubt but this city of London was also walled with stone, in the time of the Roman government here, but yet very lately, for it seemeth not to have been walled in the year of our Lord 296, because in that year, when Alectus the tyrant was slain in the field, the Franks easily entered London and had sacked the same, had not God, of his great favour, at the very instant, brought along the river of Thames, certain bands of Roman soldiers, who slew those Franks in every street of the city. FOOTNOTES: [2] “As Rome, the chiefe citie of the world, to glorifie it selfe, drew her originall from the gods, goddesses, and demy gods, by the Trojan progeny, so this famous citie of London for greater glorie, and in emulation of Rome, deriveth itselfe from the very same originall. For, as Jeffreye of Monmoth, the Welche historian, reporteth, Brute descended from the demy god Eneas, the sonne of Venus, daughter of Jupiter, aboute the yeare of the world 2855, the yeare before Christe’s nativitie, 1108, builded a citie neare unto a river now called Thames, and named it Troynovant, or Trenovant.”--_1st edition_, 1598. [3] _Cair Lundein_, in the list of ancient British cities, preserved in Nennius. [4] “The like whereof the Irishmen, our next neighbours, doe at this day call _paces_.”--_1st edition_, p. 4. [5] Richborough, about one mile and a half from Sandwich, the _Rutupium_ of the Romans, was a place of great importance until destroyed by the Danes in 1010. [6] On the banks of the river Verlam, opposite to St. Alban’s, which is supposed to have arisen out of its ruin. [7] Silchester, in Hampshire, seven miles from Basingstoke; the _Caer Segont_ of the Britons, and _Segontium_ of the Romans, and _Silcester_ of the Saxons. Leland states its walls to have been two miles in compass. [8] Wroxeter, five miles from Shrewsbury. Its walls are stated to have been three yards in thickness, and to have extended for a circumference of three miles. [9] Kenchester, three miles from Hereford, supposed to be the _Ariconium_ of the Romans. [10] Ribchester, six miles from Blackburn, in Lancashire, supposed to be the _Rego-dunum_ of the Romans. [11] Aldborough, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, the _Isurium Brigantium_ of the Romans. WALL ABOUT THE CITY OF LONDON