The Cantiaci or Cantii were a Celtic people living in Britain before the Roman conquest, and gave their name to a civitas of Roman Britain. They lived in the area now called Kent, in south-eastern England. Their capital was Durovernum Cantiacorum, now Canterbury.
They were bordered by the Regnenses to the west, and the Catuvellauni to the north.
Julius Caesar landed in Cantium in 55 and 54 BC, the first Roman expeditions to Britain. He recounts in his De Bello Gallico v. 14:
- "Ex his omnibus longe sunt humanissimi qui Cantium incolunt, quae regio est maritima omnis, neque multum a Gallica differunt consuetudine."
- "Of all these (British tribes), by far the most civilised are they who dwell in Kent, which is entirely a maritime region, and who differ but little from the Gauls in their customs".