native marshland; and of the more numerous Saxons,
though a great swarm went out to conquer southern Britain,
a vast body was still left behind in Germany, where
it continued independent and pagan till the time of
Karl the Great, long after the Teutonic colonists
of Britain had grown into peaceable and civilised
Christians. It is from the statements of later
historians with regard to these continental Saxons
that our knowledge of the early English customs and
institutions, during the continental period of English
history, must be mainly inferred. We gather our
picture of the English and Saxons who first came to
this country from the picture drawn for us of those
among their brethren whom they left behind in the
primitive English home.
These three tribes, the Jutes, the English, and the
Saxons, had not yet, apparently, advanced far enough
in the idea of national unity to possess a separate
general name, distinguishing them altogether from the
other tribes of the Germanic stock. Most probably
they did not regard themselves at this period as a
single nation at all, or even as more closely bound
to one another than to the surrounding and kindred
tribes. They may have united at times for purposes
of a special war; but their union was merely analogous
to that of two North American peoples, or two modern
European nations, pursuing a common policy for awhile.
At a later date, in Britain, the three tribes learned
to call themselves collectively by the name of that
one among them which earliest rose to supremacy—the
English; and the whole southern half of the island
came to be known by their name as England. Even
from the first it seems probable that their language
was spoken of as English only, and comparatively little
as Saxon. But since it would be inconvenient to
use the name of one dominant tribe alone, the English,
as equivalent to those of the three, and since it
is desirable to have a common title for all the Germanic
colonists of Britain, whenever it is necessary to speak
of them together, we shall employ the late and, strictly
speaking, incorrect form of “Anglo-Saxons”
for this purpose. Similarly, in order to distinguish
the earliest pure form of the English language from
its later modern form, now largely enriched and altered
by the addition of Romance or Latin words and the
disuse of native ones, we shall always speak of it,
where distinction is necessary, as Anglo-Saxon.
The term is now too deeply rooted in our language
to be again uprooted; and it has, besides, the merit
of supplying a want. At the same time, it should
be remembered that the expression Anglo-Saxon is purely
artificial, and was never used by the people themselves
in describing their fellows or their tongue.
When they did not speak of themselves as Jutes, English,
and Saxons respectively, they spoke of themselves
as English alone.
THE ENGLISH BY THE SHORES OF THE BALTIC.
