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THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE

From the many valuable and interesting notes about similar remains in England, which have been added by Mr. Thoms from the writings of other antiquaries, it will appear, that there exists a great similarity between the Danish and the British antiquities. The same division of the antiquities into three classes,—those belonging to the periods of Stone, and Bronze, and Iron,—which has been adopted in the arrangement of the Danish primeval monuments, will apply to the British remains; and very nearly the same results, in regard to the state of civilization in the stone and bronze periods, as have been gained for Denmark, will also be gained for Britain through a careful examination of its primeval antiquities. At the same time it is perfectly clear, that the British antiquities, when once sufficiently collected, examined and compared, will on the whole give more interesting and important results, than have been derived from those of Denmark, or of most other countries, because they belong to so many and such different people. I myself in my travels in Holland, Ireland, and England, have seen how many most interesting antiquities and monuments still exist in those countries; and I am fully convinced, that a systematical description and comparison of those remains will throw quite a new light upon the early state of the British islands, and particularly that it will present inestimable illustrations on the civilization and connections of the people from the time of the Anglo-Saxons until the invasion of the Normans. It is only through the monuments that we are enabled to trace the influence of the Roman civilization upon the Celts, until it was superseded by those new invaders, who laid the foundation of the subsequent progress of England on the ruins of the Roman civilization. I hope the day is not far distant