Page:Early Man in Britain and His Place in the Tertiary Period.djvu/359

] purity, crossed with Celtic, Danish, Norse, and English blood (see Fig. 112).

From this outline of the evidence of history and ethnology it will be seen that the Iberic tribes occupied an important position in Europe in ancient times, and are still amply represented in the present population. When we consider the many invasions of strangers, and the oscillations to and fro of different peoples, it is impossible not to realise the strange persistence of the race. Through all the troubles which followed the conquest of Gaul by Cæsar, and of Britain by Claudius, through the terrible events which accompanied the downfall of the Roman Empire, causing the Britons to be exterminated over a large part of England, and the almost total extinction of the ancient type of Roman in Italy, the Iberian lived, and still is found in his ancient seats, with physique scarcely altered, and offering a strong contrast to the fair-haired Celtic, Belgic, and German invaders. The Iberian race is known to the ethnologist and historian merely in fragments, sundered from each other by many invasions and settlements of the Aryan race. It is shown by the researches into caves and tombs to have been in possession of the whole of Europe north and west of the Rhine, in the Neolithic age, and has been traced by Dr. Virchow into Germany and Denmark.

If, as we have seen above, the Iberian race is still represented in Britain, we may naturally inquire whether there be any traces of it offered by the Welsh language. In discussing this question Professor Sayce remarks that "language cannot be the test of race at all, but