ar to sacrifice to Christ, and
another small one to offer victims to devils'.[4]

The continuity of the ancient religion is proved by the references to it in
the classical authors, the ecclesiastical laws, and other legal and
historical records.

1st cent. Strabo, 63 B.C.-A.D. 23.

'In an island close to Britain, Demeter and Persephone are venerated
with rites similar to the orgies of Samothrace.'[5]

4th cent. Dionysius says that in islands near Jersey and Guernsey the rites
of Bacchus were performed by the women, crowned with leaves; they danced
and made an even greater shouting than the Thracians.[6]

7th cent. Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, 668-690.

The _Liber Poenitentialis_[7] of Theodore contains the earliest
ecclesiastical laws of England. It consists of a list of offences and the
penance due for each offence; one whole section is occupied with details of
the ancient religion and of its rites. Such are:

Sacrifice to devils.

Eating and drinking in a heathen temple, (_a_) in ignorance, (_b_) after
being told by the [Christian] priest that it is sacrilege and the table of
devils, (_c_) as a cult of idols and in honour of idols.

'Not only celebrating feasts in the abominable places of the heathen
and offering food there, but also consuming it. Serving this hidden
idolatry, having relinquished Christ. If anyone at the kalends of
January goes about as a stag or a bull; that is, making himself into a
wild animal and dressing in the skin of a herd animal, and putting on
the heads of beasts; those who in such wise transform themselves into
the appearance of a wild animal, penance for three years because this
is devilish.'

_The Laws of Wihtraed_, King of Kent,[8] 690.

Fines inflicted on those who offer to devils.

8th cent. _The Confessionale and Poenitentiale of Ecgberht_, first
Archbishop of York,[9] 734-766.

Prohibition of offerings to devils; of witchcraft; of auguries according to
the methods of the heathen; of vows paid, loosed, or confirmed at wells,
stones, or trees; of the gathering of herbs with any incantation except
Christian prayers.

_The Law of the Northumbrian priests._[10]

'If then anyone be found that shall henceforth practise any
heathenship, either by sacrifice or by "fyrt", or in any way love
witchcraft, or worship idols, if he be a king's thane, let him pay X
half-marks; half to Christ, half to the ki