The genuine history of the Britons asserted against Mr. Macpherson ...

96 THE GEI^I/INE: HISTORY GF
and appropriate name of Albion ^ It was common
to all the iflands about it. Albion ipfi nomen
fait, cum Britannise vocarentur omnes -. And
Mr. Macpherfon's etymology is overthrown at the
firfl onfet. — In the fame Hiftory I have equally
Ihewn from Richard, that Britain was not the
name of the illand originally s. It was the appel-
lation of the iilanders. Vocabulo gcntls fu;^
Britanniam cognominaverunt 4. And Mr. Mac-
pherfon's etymology is again overthrown.
The real eymon feems to be what is propofed
in the Hiflory of Manchefter s. Perhaps I am
partial to it, as my own. And I will therefore
endeavour to open it more fully, and to examine
it more attentively, than I did before.
Albion is obvioufiy derived from the view of
the coaft, before it had been vifited from the
continent. Britain therefore, as the fecondary
name, was affixed to the country at or after the
firft migration into it. While it was only feen
from the lliores of Gaul, the name of Albion
mud have continued, as the moft natural deno-
mination of the country. And when it came
to be fettled, when a body of Gauls had actually
migrated acrofs the fea with their v/ives and
children into it, they would Hill ufe the name
* P. 9.
* L. iv. c. 16. And Ptolemy accordingly
calls Ireland and Albion equally a Britifn ifland. ' P. 9.
'^ P. I. And Ilidorc fays the fame ; Britannia a vocabulo fiia:
gentis cogn«minata, p. 125, Cologne, 1617. ^ P. 8— 10.
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