Ancient_and_modern_York_a_guide

MODERN YORK. 9
emperors as Britain. The apostles were commanded to
preach to all the known nations of the earth ; and we
have it on the authority of Tertullian, that multitudes of
the Roman soldiers, in the reign of Severus, were con
verts to Christianity ; from which fact we presume it may
be safely inferred, that Christianity had found its way to
this city in the time of the Romans. The Saxon chronicle
says, that "when Elutherius undertook the bishoprick
(Sax. lisceopdom) of Rome, Lucius, king of the Britons,
sent letters to him, and prayed that he might be made a
Christian." Lucius was the son of Coilus ; whose resi
dence, we are informed, was in York. Further ; accord
ing to the accounts of the council, called by Constantine
the Great, at Aries, against the Donatists, a.d. 314,
which were published by Simon, at Paris, Eborius—one
of the three British bishops who attended—signs himself
bishop of York;* there appears, therefore, to be little
doubt that Christianity did exist in Britain and this city,
anterior to the time of the Saxons.
After a dreadful conflict, which lasted nearly 150 years,
the Heptarchy, comprising the seven Saxon kingdoms,
was founded ; and, a.d. 547, Ida became king of North
umberland (i.e. the land north of the Humber), of which
York was created the capital. At the departure of the
Romans, and till about this time, Kaer Ebranc (York)
was the fibst of Britain's twenty-eight cities ; Kaer-
Lundune (London) being accounted the fourth.] It is
somewhat to our purpose to observe, that the kingdom of
Northumberland was almost immediately sub-divided ;
,3311a, another Saxon prince, ruling Yorkshire and Lan
cashire, with the title of king of the De'iri ; York was the
chief city of this kingdom. We note this fact, because
it connects this county with the most important event in
the English annals—the conversion of the whole island to
* Gough's edition of Camden's Britannia.
+ Nennius.