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Sat 17 Sep, 2011 08:59 pm
The language, Romans, which by you
So long before was known,
Is now at length by us attained
And used with our own;
The Britons severed from the world,
Though Virgil truly sung,
They now can well his works peruse
In his own Latin tongue.
Briton is an island, at the turn of the 1st millennium it was difficult to get on or off. In other words, the island was severed, cut off, apart from mainland Europe. Where coincidentally, Latin was spoken. Until the Romans invaded the island, the brits did not speak latin.
Severed is just a poetic way of saying separated from[the rest of Europe]. The point is that Britain, home of the Britons, is an island, therefore separated from the rst of the continent.
[EDIT: severed=cut off.]
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