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Ancient London

Decent Essays

London was founded by Brutus of Troy about 1000-1100 B.C. after he defeated the incumbent giants Gog and Magog and the encampment was known as Caer Troia and Troia Nova in which conjunction with pseudo-etymology, was corrupted to Trinovantum, according to the legendary Historia Regum Britanniae which wrote by Geoffrey of Monmouth. The area prior to the Romans was inhabited by the Trinovantes who were the Iron Age.Geoffrey provides prehistoric London with a rich array of legendary kings, such as Lud who, he claims, renamed the town Caer Ludein, from which London was derived, and was buried at Ludgate. However, despite intensive excavations, archaeologists have found no evidence of a prehistoric major settlement in the area. There have been scattered prehistoric finds, evidence of farming, burial and traces of habitation, but nothing more substantial. It is now considered unlikely that a pre-Roman city existed, but as some of the Roman city remains unexcavated, it is still just possible that some major settlement may yet be discovered. London was most likely a rural area with scattered settlement. Rich finds such as the Battersea Shield, found in the Thames near Chelsea, suggest the area was important; there may have …show more content…

In 1999, the remains of a Bronze Age bridge were found, again on the foreshore south of Vauxhall Bridge. This bridge either crossed the Thames, or went to a now lost island in the river. Dendrology dated the timbers to 1500BC. In 2001 a further dig found that the timbers were driven vertically into the ground on the south bank of the Thames west of Vauxhall Bridge. In 2010 the foundations of a large timber structure, dated to 4000BC, were found on the Thames foreshore, south of Bridge. The function of the Mesolithic structure is not known. All these structures are on the south bank at a natural crossing point where the River Effra flows into the

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