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by-and-by, in a short time. founders, beginners.
degrees, a little at a time. speech, language.
example, lead; copy. states, small countries or kingdoms.
fain, glad. wrested, took by force.
seafaring tribes, people who spent their lives as seamen.
1. Not long after the Romans left the country, the Picts and the Scots again invaded South Britain. The Britons, it is said, being unable to resist them,called in the aid of certain seafaring tribes from the other side of the North Sea. These people gladly came; and they liked the country so well that they were fain to make it their own.
2. So they wrested from the Britons (or Welsh, as they called them), whom they had come to help, land on which they and their families might settle. These settlers were the founders of the English Nation. By-and-by there came other tribes of the same race, which settled on different parts of coast. In the end, they founded as many the seven or eight States in South Britain, and thus drove the Welsh into the north and the west of the country.
3. The names of some of these States (as Essex. Sussex, Wessex
) show that they were founded by Saxons. Others (as East Anglia
and Northumbria
) were founded by people called Angles. The Angles got most of the land, and became the most powerful tribe. So, when the two peoples grew into one, they were called Anglo-Saxons—that is, Angles and Saxons. They called their speech English, and their country ENGLAND—that is, the Land of the English.
[The different Anglian and Saxon States, in the order of their settlement, were,
4. When the Angles and the Saxons came to Britain they were heathens in religion, and little better than savages in life and manners. But Augustine
began to teach the Christian religion in Kent in 597, and then a great change began. The King of Northumbria became Christian soon afterwards, and the other States quickly followed his example.
5.These early kingdoms were generally at war with one another;and the weaker States were thus by degrees swallowed up in the stronger ones. In this way the land came to be divided among three States—Wessex, Mercia
,b and Northumbria. These three then strove; and in 827 King Egbert of Wessex, the father of Alfred the Great, got the mastery, and ruled over all the land.
中文阅读
1. 罗马人离开不久，皮克特人和苏格兰人再次入侵不列颠南部，据说这时不列颠人完全不知所措，根本无法迎敌交战。情急之下，他们向北海的一些海上部落寻求帮助，而这些人不仅兴冲冲地来了，而且一来就爱上了这个温柔富贵乡，再也不走了。
2. 本应是来帮忙御敌的，结果却强占了不列颠人（或者叫威尔士人，他们就是这样称呼不列颠人的）的国土，并且还拖家带口在这里定居下来。可别小瞧这些移民，他们就是英国民族的奠基人。后来们其他部落的人也陆续过来定居，并分布在不同的沿海地区。到最后（公元582年），整个不列颠南部由此形成了七八个小国，威尔士人反而被他们赶到了西部和北部地区。
3. 这些小国的某些国名（比如埃塞克斯、苏塞克斯、韦塞克斯
）就显示出它们是由撒克逊人所建立，还有一些国名（比如东盎格利亚
和北布里亚
）则显示出它们是由一个叫做盎格鲁人的族群所建立。盎格鲁人逐渐占据了绝大部分土地，成为全岛最有实力的部落。因此后来当这两个族群合并时，就叫做盎格鲁-撒克逊民族，即盎格鲁人和撒克逊人的混合。他们的语言叫做英语，他们的国家叫做英格兰——字面意义就是讲英语的人的土地。
4. 当盎格鲁人与撒克逊人初来不列颠时，他们都还是异教徒，在饮食起居的文明礼数方面跟野蛮人几乎没什么两样。但是当公元597年，奥古斯丁开始在肯特传播基督教信仰之后，他们巨大的改变也就慢慢开始了。首先是诺森布里亚国王成了基督徒，接着其他邦国首领皆纷纷效仿，信仰了基督。
5. 这些早期的王国首领们，相互之间经常兵戎相见。弱小的国家逐渐被强大的国家所吞并，因此到后来这片土地上只剩下三个强国：韦塞克斯、麦西亚
和诺森布里亚。这三个国家各自不断发展，到了827年，韦塞克斯国王，即阿尔弗雷德大帝的父亲——伟大的埃格伯特，终于完成统一，成为整个不列颠的国王。