Britons/History

During the Dark Ages, the Saxons, Angles, Jutes and Frisians were colonising England and forced the Celts back to Kernow, Scotland and Wales. Wales contained several small kingdoms, although there were a few rulers, such as Rhodri the Great, who controlled nearly all of Wales. The separate kingdoms, with the help of the mountainous terrain, managed to hold the Germanic raiders at bay, although Kernow was soon lost. Part of the native British population displaced by the Saxons to the southeast of the British isles migrated across the Channel into Gaul, and established what is today the territory of Brittany in modern day France. To the north, Scotland before the 9th century was a divided country. In that time the Picts were dominant in the north-east and the Scots of Dal Riada in the west, while Vikings would occupt the Hebrides, Orkney, and Shetland. Many other petty kingdoms (such as Fife) were mostly British in nature. Many centuries later in 1603, the crowns of the two kingdoms were united under King James VI of Scotland and I of England, but during the Middle Ages, the rivalry between these two countries was at its most intense.