 As late as the 8th century, the Saxon inhabitants of St Albans, near the Roman city of Verulamium, were aware of their ancient neighbour, which they knew alternatively as "Verulamacæstir" (or, under what H. R. Loyn terms "their own hybrid", "Vaeclingscæstir", "the fortress of the followers of Wæcla") interpretable as a pocket of Romano-Britons that remained within the Anglo-Saxon countryside, probably speaking their own local neo-Latin.Before Roman rule ended, Brittonic had remained the dominant language in the highland zone.However, the speakers of Vulgar Latin were significantly but temporarily boosted in the 5th century by the influx of Romano-Britons from the lowland zone who were fleeing the Anglo-Saxons.