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Lots happened around this time and the transfer market was in full swing. A guy called Commius, ruler of the Gaulish
Atrebates
tribe, fled Gaul and became king of the Atrebates tribe of south-central England, with a capital at Silchester (near Reading). He took over everything and
even issued
his own coins. He had accompanied Julius Caesar on both of his expeditions to Britain but then changed sides and joined a revolt in Gaul led by a man named
Vercingetorix in 52AD. They lost and so he fled Gaul. It seems everybody was revolting at this time. I put this piece in so you could see that even that long
ago people were moving around quite a lot as well as changing to whichever side was winning.
At around this time settlements known as oppida began to appear. These were large sites often defined by rivers and ditches. The word oppidum,
oppida is the plural, comes from Latin, the language of the Romans if you remember, and means administrative centre. You can already see that even if Caesar
had gone back to Gaul and then later to Rome where he was killed by his fellow rulers, the influence of the Roman way of life was getting bigger and bigger.
The largest of these centres were at Colchester, St Albans and a place called Silchester which is now only a small village. These centres did a
lot of trade with Rome, were ruled by very powerful chiefs and, as archaeologists have found, were places where burials of the rich took place. People had
been trading with Rome for some time receiving wine and spices in return for tin and copper but now they may have started to receive pottery and metalwork
and exported grain. It is quite likely that some wealthy chiefs sent their sons to Rome for a while to complete their education
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