The Phœnician origin of Britons, Scots & Anglo-Saxons : discovered by Phœnician & Sumerian inscriptions in Britain, by preroman Briton coins & a mass of new history : with over one hundred illustrations and maps

166 PHGNICIAN ORIGIN OF BRITONS & SCOTS

reported years of reign in Britain of Brutus and his continuous line of descendants and successors down to Cassivellaunus and his successors in the Roman period, as the traditional length of the reign of each king is recorded (see details in Appendix I.) There is nothing improbable or at all surprising in a ruling race of Phoenician ancestry having preserved a complete written list of their kings with the length of reigns of each on parchment records, the originals of which have now perished ; for the Phoenicians are admitted by the ancient Greek classic writers to have introduced the art of writing into Europe; and writing was a practical necessity for these early industrial sea-traders in the keeping of their accounts—a class of documents which form the majority of the ancient records recovered by excavations on early oriental civilized sites.

These regnal years in the Early British Chronicles, when totalled up, give the epoch of Brutus’ arrival in Alban or Britain at about 1103 B.c. (see Appendix I.). This date is corroborated by the usually-accepted date for the Fall of Troy at “‘about 1200 B.c.”’!; for, as Brutus was of the third generation from Aineas, and was already a mature hero of many exploits at the epoch of his arrival, this would place his invasion somewhere about 1100 B.c. Geoffrey’s Chronicle also states that,after Brutus had finished the building of his new city on the Thames, “ the sons of Hector (son of Priam), after the expulsion of the posterity of Antenor, reigned in Troy,’ which would yield a corresponding date. It is also highly suggestive of such a date for Brutus’ arrival, as well as for the independence and veracity of these British Chronicles, that their compilers, in bringing 7Eneas past the bay which was latterly occupied by Carthage, should, unlike Virgil, who brings “Eneas to Carthage, nevertheless make no mention of Carthage. This was obviously owing to the fact that Carthage was not founded traditionally until about

» The epoch of this great Trojan War is estimated by the archeological remains unearthed at the excavations of the site of ancient Troy, or NoyoIlium, at the modern Hissarlich (or Ancient Fortress) being found to belong to the Mycenian period of culture, which extends from about 1500 to 1200 B.¢.—the last being the terminal date for the destruction of this Troy according to Dérpfeld, Tvoja and Ilion, 1902 ; and compare S.L., 202.