I know that the Romans Army abandoned Britain, some time in the 3rd century. By that time, Britain had been a Romanized society for 10+ generations-people wore Roman dress, lived in Roman villas, and used Roman baths. Now, some general withdraws his legions, and Roman Britain is open to attack from the Picts and Norse-how long did it take the Roamn way of life to disappear? Without the legions to guard them, the roads and sea routes were now dangerous…so we begin to see a reversion to the feudal lifestyle. Still, people must have liked using hot baths, being able to travel, trade with europe, etc. So there must have been some efforts to maintain the good life.
How long did it take for the Roman lifestyle to completely disappear?
We’ll let you know when it happens.
“People called the Romans they go the house?”
First of all, nothing reverted to feudal. Feudal grew from the merger of the lifestyle of antiquity.
In case of Britain, Roman ways disappeared quickly. The Germanic/Nordic peoples literally arrived as the Romans left, and the population was beginning a rapid decline. (As evidenced by the signs of people living in the baths.)
Not a GQ answer, but of interest nonetheless: Jack Whyte’s “A Dream of Eagles/Camulod Chronicles” series retells the story of Merlin/Arthur in mostly highly realistic end-of-Roman-Britain/start-of-Saxon-Invasion terms. (“Mostly” because there’s a bit of psychological fantasy thrown into the later books to explain Merlin’s later reputation – but the first four books are solidly researched quasi-historical fiction that evoke the mise-en-scene of the time and place remarkably well.
Moved MPSIMS --> GQ.
That’s the reason the Saxons were in England in the first place. When the legions left, the natives hired the Saxons as mercenaries.
Well, that’s the story told about Vortigern and Hengest/Horsa – some were no doubt riders or invaders, some peaceful immigrants trying to escape unrest on the continent and find a peaceful place to settle, etc. I’ve found a lot of times, when the question is “Was A’s cause actually X, or Y, or Z?”, the actual right answer is often “Yes – one or more of the above, depending on the individual case.” It’s kind of like blaming World War I on Gavrilo Prinzip, without taking into account the multiplicity of interrelated things that his assassinating Franz Ferdinand triggered into toppling like dominoes.
A tangent that may be of interest: I just finished Philip Matyszak’s Legionary, a history of the Roman army in the form of an illustrated instruction manual, taking a soldier through the 25 years (!) of his career from recruitment to training, deployment and battle, then his wounding, death, triumph and/or retirement. Very interesting, and just light-hearted enough in tone to mask the essential bloodthirstiness of the topic.
Typo I missed. That should have been “… raiders or invaders…”
Things like public baths, villas, and marketplaces aren’t going to last very long. As soon as the Roman legions pull out and stop protecting them, the barbarians that were waiting just across the old frontier are going to swoop in and start looting.
The locals might want to provide their own protection for their civilization but they’ve just seen their world get significantly reduced. If the Roman Empire as a whole couldn’t afford to maintain the troops to protect Britain, then the Romano-Britons who got left behind probably can’t afford it either. If there had been enough wealth in Britain to pay for its defense, the Romans wouldn’t have abandoned it.
To directly answer your question, Germanic peoples were settling and raiding what is now England during the first half of the 5th century. They started as soon as the Romans left, and may well have been given a heads up by Germanic mercenaries in the Roman legions. If an Arthur existed, he would have been in what might have been a battle near 500. The Roman way of life vanished in the 5th and 6th centuries, as evidenced by the disappearance of Christianity.
It wasn’t really money, it was people. Britain had always required a fair number of legions, in part, because the locals were never completely subdued or Romanized. I believe Nero almost abandoned Britain, during the height of Roman wealth and power, because of a revolt. But, it was worth it for the metals.
Manpower was the more pressing issue. There is good evidence that the whole empire was depopulating, and that hit the west especially hard.
Didn’t Bede live sometime around then?
It’s not fair to describe Boudica’s attempt as a mere revolt. 
Btw, I absolutely love hearing about how 8,000 Roman soldiers killed 80,000 of Boudica’s men. It really speaks to the Roman’s military power at the time.
Couple centuries later: 672/3-735 are his dates.
Gildas is the main source for those days.
From the Brythonic side, of course.
Britain was one of the better off parts of the empire by the start of the fifth century. It had been more peaceful and prosperous than, say, Gaul, for quite some time and the Romans didn’t so much abandon it as lost it to self-government, while their capital city was being sacked.
For centuries after the 410, the traditional date of the end of Roman rule, trade was maintained between the West Country and the mediterranean. Saxons had almost certainly been present before 410 as mercenaries for the Romans, who recruited many of their soldiers from Germany (it has been suggested that the “Saxon Shore” was garrisoned by, rather than against, Saxons, but that’s probably unlikely). So there was no set date when Britain was suddenly no longer Roman, as areas of Anglian and Saxon domination expanded over the course of centuries and as villas were abandoned, hill forts reoccupied and eventually territory lost by the Cambric speaking peoples. Nonetheless there was a significant degree of continuity between the two periods, continued settlement in several Roman centres such as Canterbury, areas of semi-independent Welshmen in Anglo-Saxon territory known as saetans, the possible Welsh roots of the Wessex dynasty and some others, the thoroughgoing trade links between Kent and the Frankish lands. Also for several decades after 410 enough survived for villas to be repaired and embellished in some places, new settlements to be built on former hill forts, organised Christianity survived well enough for visiting Bishops to be despatched from the continent to reprove heretics and enough military organisation survived for the infamous expedition of Riothamus to the continent with a British army.
Thanks for the info. Would a town like Bath (and its famous Roman baths) remain in use? One would think that hot baths would have an attraction-even to barbarians.
As for trade-Britain was a big supplier of lead and tin-were the mines worked after the Romans left?
Nobody gives up on an abundant supply of metal. They were worked.
Not according to William and Mary’s Phillip Daileader. The civilian Roman govt was kicked out just a few years after the Roman army left. Barter replaced coins, and the towns were abandoned. Their actually is archaeological evidence that the baths were abandoned, as people lived in them, specifically in Bath. Christianity was re-introduced in the 7th century.
Gaul may not have been peaceful, but the Goths, Franks, and others all attempted to maintain more or less Roman civilization until the 7th or 8th centuries. Spain never really lost it, as it held on to a more or less Roman civ character for a little while even after the Muslims conquered it, and it expanded economically as they brought more suitable farming techniques.