ThoughChronologicalandHistoricalMatters, may not seem so properly the Subject of these Tracts, yet there having, in one of the late Meetings of theRoyal Society, been some Discourse about the Place whereJulius CesarLanded inBritain, and it having been required of me to shew the Reason why I concluded it to have been in theDowns; in doing thereof, I have had the good Fortune so far to please those worthy Patrons of Learning I have the Honour to serve, that they thought fit to command it to be inserted in thePhilosophical Transactions, as an instance of the great Use ofAstronomical Computationfor fixing and ascertaining the Times of memorable Actions, when omitted or not duly delivered by the Historian.
1. The Authors that mention this Expedition with any Circumstances, areCæsarin hisCommentarieslib.4, andDion Cassiusinlib.39;Livy's account being lost, in whose 105th.Book might possibly have been found theStory more at large. It is certain that this Expedition ofCæsars, was in the Year of theConsulateofPompeyandCrassus, which was in the Year ofRome699. or the 55thbefore the usual Æra of Christ: And as to the time of the Year,Cæsarsays thatExigua parte æstatis reliqua, he came over only with two Legions,viz.the 7thand 10thand all Foot, in about 80 Sail of Merchant Ships, 18 Sail that were ordered to carry the Horse not being able to get out at the same time from another Port, where they lay Wind-bound. He says that he arrived about the 4th hour of the Day,viz.between Nine and Ten in the Morning, on the Coast ofBritain, where he found the Enemy drawn up on theCliffsready to repel him, which place he thus describes.Loci hæc erat natura, adeo montibus augustis mare continebatur ut ex locis superioribus in littus telum adjicit possit, by which theCliffsofDoverand theSouth Forelandare justly described, and could be no other Land, being he says in the 5thBook of his Commentaries,in Britanniam trajectum esse cognoverit circitur millium passum triginta à continenti, theCliffsof theNorth-Forelandbeing at a much greater distance. Here he says he came to an Anchor, and staid till the 9thhour, or till about between Three and Four in the Afternoon, expecting till his whole Fleet was come up; and in the mean time called a Council of War, and advertised his Officers, after what manner they were to make their Descent, particularly in relation to the Stuff of the Sea, whose motion he callscelerem atq. instabilem, quick and uneven. Then,viz.aboutThree in the Afternoon he weighed Anchor, and having gotten theWindandTidewith him, he Sail'd about Eight Miles from the first place, and Anchor'd against an open and plain Shore.
2. Here he made his Descent, and having told us the opposition that was made, and the means he used to get on Shore, he comes to say, that after he had beenFour DaysinBritain, the 18 Ships with his Horse put to Sea, and were come in sight of his Camp, when a suddain Tempest arose, with contrary Wind, so that some of the Ships put back again, others were driven to the Westwards, not without great danger, and coming to Anchor, they found they could not ride it out: so when Night came on, they put off to Sea and returned from whence they came.That same Nightit wasFull-Moon, which makes the greatest Tides in the Ocean, and they being ignorant thereof, their Gallies, which were drawn on Shore, were filled by the Tide,&c.
3. Then he says that the Day of the Autumnal Equinox being at hand, after some Days stay, wherein there passed no Action because he kept close in his Camp by the shore; and not thinking it proper to stay till the Winter came on, he returned intoGallia: The next Year he made a further Expedition with 5 Legions and a good Body of Horse, but there is but little in the History thereof serving to our purpose, excepting that he says he set Sail from thePortus Iciusabout Sun Set, with a gentle S. W. Wind,leni Africo profectus; that about Midnight it fell Calm,and being carried away with the Tide, by the time it was Day, he found he had leftBritainon the left hand; but then the Tide turning they fell to their Oars, and by Noon reached that part of the Island where he Landed before, and came on Shore without opposition: and then March'd up into the Country, leaving his Ships at Anchorin littora molli & aperto.
4. This is all inCæsarthat is any thing pertinent, and I find no where else any thing to guide us farther, except one passage inDion Cassius, who speaking of the first Landing ofCæsar, says οὐ μέντοι καὶ ᾗ ἔδει προσέσχεν, that is, as I Translate it. But he Landed not where he intended, for that theBritainshearing of his coming, had possest all usual Places of Landing Ἄκραν οὖν τινὰ προέχουσαν περιπλεύσας ἑτέρωσε παρεκομίσθη. Κἀνταῦθα τοὺς προσμίξαντάς οἱ ἐς τὰ τενάγη ἀποβαίνοντι νικήσας, ἔφθη τῆς γῆς κρατήσας, in my English. Wherefore doubling a certain head Land, he made to the Shore on the other side, where he overcame those that Skirmished with him at the Waters edg, and so got well on Land. Here I make bold to translate the Words ἐς τὰ τενάγη,at the water edge, which inH. StephensEdition is interpretedin paludibus, but I have the Authority ofSuidas, who says τέναγος, πελαγία ἰλὺς, or the Sea Mud, and is therefore properly the Ouse on the Sea Shore, and by an easie Figure may be put for the Shore it self, where such Ouse commonly is found.
5. From thesedata, That it was in the Year of theConsulateofPompey, andCrassus; That it wasExigua parte æstatis reliqua, andFour Days before a Full-Moon, which fell out in the Night time. The time of this Invasion will be determined to a Day: For by the Eclipse of the Moon, whereofDrususmade so good use to quiet a Mutiny in thePannonianArmy, upon the News of the Death ofAugustus, it follows thatAugustusDiedAnno Christi14. which was reckonedAnno Vrbis conditæ767. and that this Action was 68 Years before,viz.in the 55thYear before Christ Current. In which Year the Full Moon fell outAugust 30.after Midnight, or 31 in the Morning before Day; and the preceeding Full-Moon, wasAugust 1.soon after Noon; so that this could not be the Full-Moon mentioned, as falling in the Day time: nor that in the beginning ofJuly, it being not 10 Days after the Summer solstice, when it would not have been saidexigua parte æstatis reliqua. It follows therefore that the Full-Moon spoken of, was onAugust 30.at Night, and that the Landing onBritainwasAugust 26.in the Afternoon, about a Month before the Autumnal equinox; which agrees to all the Circumstances of the Story in point of Time.
6. As to the Place, the high Land and Cliffs described, could be no other than those ofDover, and are allowed to have been so by all, it remains only to examine whether the Descent was made to the Northward or Southward of the place where he first Anchored. Thedatato determine this are first that it was Four Days before the Full-Moon. 2. That that Day by Three of the Clock in the Afternoon the Tide ran the same way heSail'd. 3dly.That a S. by E. Moon makes High-Water on all that Coast, the Flood coming from the Southward: hence it will follow, that that Day it was High-Water there about Eight in the Morning, and consequently Low-Water about Two, wherefore by Three the Tide of Flood was well made up, and it is plain thatCæsarwent with it, and the Flood setting to the Northward shews that the open plain Shore where he Landed was to the Northward of the Cliffs, and must be in theDowns; and this I take to be little less than Demonstration. A second Argument is drawn from the Wind wherewith he set out on his second Expedition,viz.S. W. as appears by the Wordsleni Africo profectus, with which the Navigation of those times would hardly permit a Ship to Sail nearer the Wind than Eight Points, or a N. W. Course; which would serve indeed to go into theDowns, but would by no means fetch the Low-land towardsDengyness, which is much about West fromCalais, and not more than W. N. W. fromBoulogne, if it shall be said that that was thePortus Iciusfrom whichCæsarset out. Whence I take it to be evident that ifCæsarwas not bound more Northerly than theSouth-Foreland, he could not have thought theAfricusor S. W. Wind proper for his passage, which was then intended for the place where he first Landed the year before.
7. Justly to determine which thePortus Iciuswas I find no where sufficient grounds; onlyPtolemycalls the Promontory ofCalais-Cliffsby the name of Ἴκιον ἄκρον, whence there is reason to conjecture, that thePortus Iciuswasvery near thereto, and that it was eitherAmbletuseon one side, orCalaison the other. The samePtolemyplaces Γισοῤῥίακον ἐπίνειον in the same Latitude with the ἴκιον ἄκρον, but something more to the East, which seems to refute those that have supposed the Ancient Port ofGessoriacumto have beenBoulogne, whereas byPtolemy's position, it must be eitherDunkirkorGraveling, but the former most likely, both by the distance from the Ἴκιον ἄκρον, being about 20 Miles or half a degree of Longitude to the East, or ⅔ of the whole Coast ofFlanders, which he makes but a degree and quarter from theAcron Icionto the mouth of theScheldwhich he callsOstia Tabudæ: As also for thatPlinyl. 4. c. 16. speaking ofGessoriacum, says theProximus TrajectusintoBritainfrom thence is 50 Miles, which is too much unlessGessoriacumwere something more Easterly thanCalais.Dion Cassiusmakes the distance betweenFranceandBritain450stadiaor 56 Miles, and says likewise 'tis the nearest, τὸ Συντομώτατον. But this is in part amended by the explication given in theItineraryofAntoninus, where the space betweenGessacorumandRutupiumis said to be 450stadia(for this was the ordinary passage of theRomansintoBritain,)Rutupiumbeing more Northerly andGessoriacummore Easterly than theterminiofCæsarsVoyage, and consequently the distance greater than 30 Miles whichCæsarhad observ'd; and now lately an accurate Survey has proved the distance between Land and Land to be 26English Milesor 28½Roman Miles, which shews how nearCæsarsestimate was to the Truth.
A farther Argument (but not of equal force with the former because of the modernness of the Author, who writ above 250 Years after) may be drawn from the words ofDion Cassius, where he says ἄκραν τινὰ προέχουσαν περιπλεύσας ἑτέρωσε παρεκομίσθη, that after his first Anchoring he Sail'd about a Promontory to the place where he Landed: Now there are no other Promontories on all that Coast but theSouth-ForelandandDengyness; the latter of which it could not be, becauseCæsarsays he Sail'd but 8 Miles, and theNessit self is about 10 Miles from the South and nearest end of theChalk-Cliffsby the Town ofHith; and to have gone round that Point to the other side, the distance must have been much greater. So that the Promontory spoken of byDion, must needs be theSouth-Foreland, andCæsarmust Anchor near over againstDover, from whence Sailing 8 Miles, he would double a Head-land and come to theDowns; which is such a Coast as he describes in one place byapertum ac planum littus, and in his 5thBook bymolle ac apertum littus. As toDionsword εἰς τὰ τενάγη, what I have already said about it seems sufficient to prove that he means no more than the Waters edg; and theEtymologistsderive it from τέγγωmadefacio, because the wash and breach of the Sea does always keep it wet. And this word τὰ τενάγη is used byPolybiusfor the Sea Ouse; and in another place he speaks of the difficulty of Landing at the mouth of a River, Διὰ τὴν τεναγώδη πάροδον,ob limosum accessum, so that it is not to be doubted that it ought to be rendred in this place,ad vadum marisrather thanin paludibus. And so this objection against the assertion thatCæsarLanded in theDowns, which is known to be a firm Champain Country without Fenns and Morasses, will be removed; and the whole Argument will 'tis hoped be admitted by the Curious.
FINIS.