Chapter VIII: Preface (8)

I conceive this game was of two sorts; that performed on foot; that on horse-back, or in chariots: the intent of both was to exercise the youth in warlike activity, for it was a sort of mock fight: that on foot was the _Pyrrhic_ dance. Suetonius says, _lusus ipse quem vulgo Pyrrhicum appellant Troja vocatur_. If we carry it up to its first original, we must affirm it was invented by the _Corybantes_, _Idei dactyli_, _Curetes_, whose institution, when confirmed among the Romans, was continued by the priests called _Salii_, dancing in armour, and clashing their weapons together with some sort of concert. Likewise the real soldiers had the same festival, which they called _armilustrium_, celebrated on the 19. Octob. of which Varro gives us an account _de lingua Lat._ Suetonius mentions it in _Tiberio_, c. 72. This, whether performed on foot or horse-back, by children, priests or soldiers, was manifestly the same thing: their gestures, turnings, returnings, knots and figures, their assaults, retreat, and the like, were aptly represented by mazes and labyrinths; which very comparison Virgil uses.

_Ut quondam Cretâ fertur labyrinthus in altâ,
Parjetibus textum cæcis iter, ancipitemque
Mille viis habuisse dolum, qua signa sequendi
Falleret indeprensus & irremeabilis error._

Such was in Crete the labyrinth of yore,
In crooked tracks immur’d, a thousand ways
Doubtful and dark: whence the return obscure,
Inextricable, in endless mazes lost.

It is likely these works of ours, made in the turf, were cast up, in order to teach the children the method of it. That on foot is elegantly described by Claudian _de_ VI. _consul. Honorii_, v. 622.

_Armatos hic sæpe choros, certaque vagandi
Textas lege fugas, inconfusosque recursus,
Et pulchras errorum artes, jucundaque Martis
Cernimus: insonuit cum verbere signa magister.
Mutatosque edunt pariter tot pectora motus,
In latus allisis clypeis, aut rursus in altum
Vibratis. grave parma sonat mucronis acuti
Murmure, & umbonum pulsu modulante resultans
Ferreus alterno concentus clauditur ense._

Here have I seen the armed rings revolve
In artful flights, in order then advance,
Attack, retire in all the forms of war,
Their eye still on the signal of the chief;
Then face about, ringing their brazen shields
Against their corslets, or uplifted high
Threaten the ecchoing skies; whilst steely blades
Harsh murmur, and the clanging targets sound
Alternate struck, the martial concert close.

The equestrian games of this denomination required more room and _apparatus_ for spectators: therefore probably they fenced in a larger space of ground, of a circular or oval form, with a _vallum_, to keep the spectators at proper distance, and upon which they might more commodiously behold the sport. This I suppose was provided for by those bowers or burroughs mentioned, where there was no ditch behind; for that would be dangerous, if the people crouding one another, as is natural on those occasions, should thrust the outermost from such an elevation: so that they were a larger sort of amphitheatres, or circs: and this seems expressly intimated by the great Mantuan in those verses,

_Munera principio ante oculos circoque locantur
In medio——
Et tuba commissos medio canit aggere ludos._

These games on horseback he thus describes:

_Olli discurrere pares, atque agmina terni
Diductis solvere choris, rursusque vocati
Convertere vias, infestaque tela tulere.
Inde alios ineunt cursus aliosque recursus
Adversis spatiis, alternosque orbibus orbes
Impediunt, pugnæque cient simulachra sub armis.
Et nunc terga fugâ nudant; nunc spicula vertunt
Infensi, factâ pariter nunc pace feruntur._

They ride by pairs: the martial cavalcade
Triple battalions form, which open first
With adverse front, and show of dreadful fight.
Then new careers they take, wheeling about
In various circles and self-ending orbs,
In all the mazy arts and forms of war;
Now turn their backs, and now afresh attack:
At length in peaceful order all march off.

It seems that our tournaments, so much in fashion till queen Elizabeth’s time, are remainders of these warlike diversions; and the triple order, by which they were conducted, may possibly be imitated in some degree by the common figure in dancing, called the _hedge_, or the _hay_; both which I suppose are derived from the Saxon _hæg_, perhaps from the Latin _agger_.

We passed by the spring of old Wintringham and the Marsh at the mouth of the Ankham, which is a vast tract of land left by the sea; and came to Feriby sluice, a stately bridge of three arches, with sluices for voidance of the water into the sea, but now broken down and lying in dismal ruins by the negligence of the undertakers: whence travellers are obliged to pass the river in a paltry short boat, commanded by a little old deaf fellow with a long beard: into this boat you descend, by the steep of the river, through a deep mirey clay, full of stones and stakes; nor is the ascent on the other side any better, both dangerous and difficult. This, with the hideous ruins of the bridge, like the picture of hell gates in Milton, and the terrible roar of the water passing through it, fitly represented Virgil’s description of Charon’s ferry: nor would a poet wish for a better scene to heighten his fancy, were he to paint out the horrors of the confines of hell.

_Hinc via Tartarei quæ fert Acherontis ad undas.
Turbidus hic cœno vastaque voragine gurges
Æstuat, atque omnem Cocyto eructat arenam.
Portitor has horrendus aquas & flumina servat
Terribili squallore Charon, cui plurima mento
Canicies inculta jacet_—— Æn. vi.

Hence the way leads to Fereby forlorn,
Where Ankham’s oozy flood with hideous roar
Tears up the sands and sluices ruin’d vaults.
A squalid Charon the dread ferry plies
In leaky scull, whose furrow’d cheeks lie deep
With hoary beard insconc’d——

When we had mounted the precipice again from the water, and paid our naul to the inexorable ferryman, we had several clayey lakes to ride over, unpassable in winter. Two roads[85] lead you to the town, a sorry ragged place, where upon the stocks is wrote, _Fear God, honour the King_. The church is set respecting no points of the compass, and just under the side of a precipice, so that you may almost leap from it upon the steeple: when we climbed the hill, it was a long while before we could find the way to Barton; and scarce could the people direct us to it, though but two miles off: at length, after wandering some time backward and forward, we hit upon the road, and, as men escaped the Stygian pool, with pleasure surveyed Barton, riding all the way through corn-fields, overlooking the Humber and Hull. Barton from hence makes a pretty prospect, having two churches, several mills, and the houses pleasantly intermixed with trees. This hill is wholly chalk, and answered on the opposite shore by another of the same nature. This is at present the passage across the Humber to Yorkshire, and we pleased ourselves at this time only with the distant view of it, and the neighbouring Hull: we could see the flag upon the castle.

[Sidenote: +Barrow.+ British _temple_.]

[Sidenote: TAB. XVIII. 2d Vol.]

At Barrow we were surprised with a castle, as the inhabitants call it, upon the salt marsh: upon view of the works I wondered not that they say it was made by Humber when he invaded Britain, in the time of the Trojan Brutus; for it is wholly dissonant from any thing I had seen before: but after sufficient _examen_ I found it to be a temple of the old Britons, therefore to be referred to another occasion. A little eastward hence we visited Thornton college, a great abbey founded by William le Gros earl of Albemarle 1139, the gate-house is very perfect; a vast tower, or castle, wherein all methods of Gothic architecture for offence and defence are employed: there is a great ditch before it, across which a bridge with walls on each hand, and arches that support a broad battlement to defend the access: before it two low round towers: this stands oblique to the building, like the bridge at the tower-gate, the better to keep off assailants by arrows shot through many narrow loop-holes: there was a portcullis at the great gate, and behind it another gate of oak: there are no windows in front: over it are three old clumsy statues in as ordinary niches: a woman seeming a queen, or the virgin Mary: to the right, a man with a lamb; I suppose, St. John baptist: to the left, a bishop or abbot with a crosier: the lamb is introduced in several other places: in the battlements above the gate are the figures of men cut in stone, as looking down: on both sides this tower goes a strong wall embattled, supported by internal arches, with towers at proper distances: along the ditch within the gate are spacious rooms and stair-cases of good stone and rib-work arches. Upon taking down an old wall there, they found a man with a candlestick, table and book, who was supposed to have been immured. When you enter the spacious court, a walk of trees conducts you to the ruins of the church: part of the south-east corner is left between the choir and transept, and behind that some of the chapter-house, which was octagonal: the whole plan of the church is easily discoverable, and round about it the foundations of a quadrangle, and lodgings, to the south of which now stands a dwelling-house, which I suppose was the abbot’s lodge: here are great moats and fish-ponds, subterraneous vaults and passages; the whole monastery being encompassed by a deep ditch and high rampart, to secure the religious from robbers, because near the sea. A mile east of Thornton are the ruins of another great castle, called Kelingholme. In Goswel parish northward is Burham, a chapel now become a farm-house, which belonged to the monastery: in the same parish, near the Humber, is Vere court, which belonged to the ancient family of that name. Good land hereabouts, well wooded: they find Roman coins all about. Two miles west of Thornton is a great Roman camp, called Yarborough, which surveys the whole hundred denominated from it, and all the sea-coast. Vast quantities of Roman coins have been found here: Mr. Howson, of Kenington hard by, has pecks of them, many of Licinius.[86]

_Stukeley del._ _I Harris Scul._]

_Stukeley del:_ A. _a piece of the Roman wall of the castle_. B. _the
Spring_. C. _another piece of the Roman wall_. _E. Kirkall sculp:_]

[Sidenote: +Yarborough.+ Ro. _town_.]

Hence we journeyed to Caster, upon another ridge of the downs, running north and south, slaunting off eastward to the sea, and steep all the way westward, reaching from the Humber to the Witham below Lincoln: a vein of sand again, and alike stocked with rabbets, answering to that on the other side the Ankham at Sandton, but a little more southward. From the hill just above Caster you have an admirable prospect both east and west; this way to the mouth of the Humber, the Spurnhead promontory, the Sunk island, and the whole country of Holderness in Yorkshire; that way, all the sea-coast of Lincoln stretched out in a long bow, jutting into the sea, full of creeks and harbours: south and west the whole county of Lincoln lies under the eye; but the height of Lincoln minster particularly pleases, which is here seen by the edge of the cliff south of Caster, and presents a very romantic landscape.

[Sidenote: +Caster.+ Ro. _town_.]

[Sidenote: TAB. XIX. 2d Vol.]

[Sidenote: TAB. XX. 2d Vol.]

The town of Caster is half way down this western steep; and in nothing more, that I have seen, did the Romans show their fine genius for choice of a station, than this: there is a narrow promontory juts forward to the west, being a rock full of springs, level at top; and on this did they build their town. One may easily guess at the original Roman scheme upon which it was founded, and now in the main preserved: this whole town takes in three squares of full 300 feet each, two of which are allotted to the castle, the third is an _area_ lying to the east before it, between it and the hill, which is still the market-place: the streets are all set upon these squares, and at right angles: at each end are two outlets, going obliquely at the corners to the country round about, two above, two descending the hill thus distributed: the north-east to the Humber mouth, south-east to Louth, north-west to Wintringham, south-west to Lincoln. What is the meaning of this place being called _Thongcaster_,[87] among some others in England, I know not; one in Kent: but it gave occasion to the same fanciful report of its original, as queen Dido’s founding Carthage upon as much ground as she could incompass with an ox’s hide cut into _thongs_; and a person in the town told me there was an history of the building Caster in _Virgil_, and offered to show it me. I should not have thought this worth mentioning, had not Mr. Camden spoke of it, as if he believed it to be true: but there can be no doubt that this castle was built long before Hengist’s time; for I saw enough of the old Roman wall to evince its founders: one great piece stands on the verge of the church-yard; another by a house: there are more behind the school-house in the pastures, and I have met with many men that have dug at its foundations in several other places: it is built of white rag-stone laid sometimes sideways, sometimes flat, in mortar exceedingly hard, full of pebbles and sand; nor is it mixed to any fineness: so that I conjecture it was the method of the Romans to pour the mortar on liquid, as soon as the lime was slaked: thus the heat and moisture, struggling together, created a most strict union or attraction between the lime and stone, the motion favouring their approximation; and the lime, no doubt, being made of the same stone, promoted a more intimate union between the cement and the hard materials by similitude of parts. I suppose this narrow tongue of land was thus encompassed with a wall quite to the market-place, objecting only its end to the plain before the hill, the rest standing upon the stoney precipice. From under the castle-walls almost quite round rise many quick springs; but Syfer spring is most famous, having now four fluxes of water from between the joints of great stones laid flat like a wall; and joined together with lead, probably first by the Romans, for it is under their wall; shaded over with trees very pleasantly: this is the morning and evening rendezvous of the servant-maids, where consequently intelligence is given of all domestic news: they say, within memory it ran much quicker, so that the water projected three or four foot from the wall; others say, that originally it ran in one stream like the sheet of a cascade. Syfer spring, no doubt, is the Saxon _syfer_, pure, clean, as the stream here deserves to be called. There is a place by the fold, south-west of the church, still called Castle-hill, where many bodies have been dug up. I am inclinable to think the meaning of _Thong-castle_ to be fetched from _Thane Degen_, Saxonicè, _miles_, _præfectus_, analogous to the Latin _comes_.[88] Here it is likely our Saxon ancestors placed a garrison of troops to secure this country, as they conquered from the Roman Britons. In the church is a monumental _effigies_, in stone, of a knight of the name of Hundon; another, of a lady; another, of a knight of St. John of Jerusalem, cross-legged.

In Snarford church some fine monuments, in alabaster, of the family of St. Paul’s. Return we now to Lindum.

_Sol medium cœli conscenderat igneus orbem
Cum muros arcemque procul & rara domorum
Tecta vides, modo quæ Romana potentia cœlo
Æquavit_—— +Virg.+ Æ. viii.

A mile north upon the Foss is a _tumulus_ of hard stone, called the Castle.

From hence I determined to proceed to London all the way on the Roman road, which perhaps has not been so scrupulously travelled upon for this thousand years: the intent, which I executed, was to perform the whole sixth journey in Antoninus his Itinerary; of which I shall give as complete an account as can be expected, considering how totally most of the stations here are erased, and that I was resolved so far to imitate an ancient traveller, as to dine and lie at a Roman town all the way if possible, and sometimes in danger of faring as meanly as a Roman soldier: nor could I always readily say,

_Longum iter hic nobis minuit mutatio crebra,
Mansio sub noctem claudit ubique diem._

Add to this, that the whole was new to me; that I had almost every place to find out; that I was alone, and had no other guide than what Mr. Gale has pointed out to us, who is the first that hit upon the true notion of this road: and I doubt not but the reader’s candour will overlook the errors or imperfections of this simple narration, of what I could observe myself, and fish out from the uncouth relations of the country people, who, for one half of the way, had never heard of enquiries of this sort since any memory, and were too apt to be morose upon that occasion, thinking I had some design upon their farms in my inquisitiveness.

_Stukeley delin._ _E. Kirkall fe._]

A. _Brough the Roman City._ B. _Newark._ C. _the cliff by the Trent._
D. _Potter hill._

_Stukeley delin._ _E. Kirkall sculp._]

[Sidenote: _Foss_ road.]

This journey proceeds from Lincoln upon the great Foss road, as it tends to the Bath quite through Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire (but most terribly defaced) till it meets with and crosses (having gone sixty miles) the great Watling-street coming from Chester, and going to Dover, at High-cross in Warwickshire: hence to London, about ninety miles more, I went upon this Watling-street, which completes that journey of the Itinerary.

[Sidenote: +Crocolana.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. XXI. 2d Vol.]

I apprehend the _Foss_ is the name transmitted through the British, which comes from _digging_, as being an artificial road; whence they are often called _dikes_, a word of contrary significations, as the Latin _altus_.[89] Descending southwards, where the Foss parts with the Hermen-street below Lincoln, by the abbey without the most southern gate, and passing over the river Witham by Bracebridge, before it comes to Lincoln; I soon perceived myself upon the Foss road, by its strait ridge carried over the barren moory ground, by a mill near Stickham. Hard by lies a stone cross of good height, of one piece, vulgarly called Robin Hood’s Whetstone upon the Foss, and is called sometimes the three-mile stone. The elevation of the road is still preserved, the common road going round about: it is much overgrown with goss, and the moor but thinly so; its strait length easily distinguishable for that reason: it butts a good deal to the east of Lincoln. Between Bracebridge and its union with the Hermen way, some pavement is left of flag-stone set edgewise: the road beyond the moor goes through the inclosures of Hikeham and Thorp, then enters Morton lane, very pleasantly set on both sides with woods full of game.[90] And so journeying to the space of about twelve Roman miles, I found Collingham on my right hand: there is a high barrow or _tumulus_ called Potters hill, where they say was a Roman pottery: it stands upon an eminence commanding a prospect both ways upon the road. Half a mile farther is Brough, the undoubted _Crocolana_ of the Romans: it is three miles North of Newark. Great plenty of wild Saffron grows hereabouts; whence I once thought the name came, signifying the saffron field, from the Celtic word, a field or inclosure (_lhan._) In the later times of the empire, when they shortened words, it was called _Colana_; and some critic restoring _Croco_ to it, doubled the second syllable; whence it is found in Antoninus his Itinerary, _Crococolanum_: but I judge Mr. Baxter’s derivation of it is right, _ericetum pulchrum_: the ground is very woody and pleasant, and full of goss or heath, in Welsh _grûg_. From _Colana_, Collinghams, two miles off, probably had their name,[91] springing up from its ruins, as well as Newark, the Saxons approaching nearer the water side; the Trent and the Foss road being neglected, which supported the Roman town by travellers chiefly. Collinghams stand upon a mere or rivulet, abounding with springs called the Fleet, running into the Trent. The lands at Collingham belong to Peterborough church; probably the gift of some king:[92] they have a report, that one arch of South Collingham church came from Brough, which is probably true of the whole: they say Collingham was a market-town before Newark; and that Brough was a famous place in time of the Danes, who destroyed it in Edmund Ironside’s days. Danethorp is hard by, the seat lately of lady Grey.

At Brough no Roman token visible, but the remarkable straitness of all the roads and by-lanes thereabouts: the city has been most perfectly levelled by the plough, so that the mark of ridge and furrow remains in the very road: the hedge-rows were planted since. Were it not for many distinguishing tokens, one may be apt to conclude as Floras did, _laborat annalium fides ut Veios fuisse credamus_. They say here was a church upon a place called chapel-yard, and a font was once taken up there. The old landlady at the little ale-house, which is the only house there, till Thomas Cope’s and another were lately built, says, that where her fire-place is, the cross once stood; and that the whole is fairy ground, and very lucky to live on. There have been many Roman coins dug up here, and all the way between it and Newark:[93] I bought a large brass _Faustina junior_, lately found in the corn-field over-against the ale-house: in digging too they find great foundations, for half a mile together, on each side the road, with much rusty iron, iron ore and iron cinders; so that it is probable here was an eminent Roman forge. Across the road was a vast foundation of a wall, and part still remains: out of one hole they showed me, has been dug up ten or fifteen load of stone; so that it should seem to have been a gate: the stones at the foundation are observed to be placed edgewise, and very large ones, but not of a good sort: this was the method the Romans justly thought most convenient, in this springy soil; for the springs rise here, all about, within two foot of the surface. They told me some very large copper Roman coins have been found here, and silver too, and many pots, urns, bricks, &c. they call the money Brough pennies. The earl of Stanford is lord of the manor, and all is copy-hold, probably originally in the crown. The country people have a notion that the Foss road is the oldest in England, and that it was made by William the Conqueror. This is all that I could learn of this city, which I thought no contemptible gleaning from the shipwreck of time; for

_Jam seges est ubi Troja fuit_——

is true of all the stations of this whole journey, more or less; and I was glad when any part of the harvest might be applied to the gathering of antiquities. From hence the road goes extremely strait to Newark between hedge-rows, having the steeple before us as a visto: but, much to their disgrace, it is in very ill repair; nay, in some places they dig the very stone and gravel out of it to mend their streets.

[Sidenote: +Newark.+]

Newark was certainly raised from the neighbouring Roman cities, and has been walled about with their remains: the northern and eastern gate, still left, are composed of stones seemingly of a Roman cut; and not improbably the Romans themselves had a town here; for many antiquities are found round about it,[94] especially by the Foss side, which runs quite through the town. My friend the reverend Mr. Warburton, of this place, gave me a coin or two dug up here; and likewise this further information, that lately a gentleman (Mr. Holden) digging to plant some trees by the Foss road side, discovered four urns lying in a strait line, and at equal distances: they were soon broke in pieces by the workmen, imagining to find treasure therein: in one there was only a rude piece of brass, about the bulk of a small walnut, half melted down, with a bit of bone and some of the ashes sticking in the surface thereof, amidst the other burnt bones and ashes: he conjectured that it was a _fibula_ belonging to the habit of the dead: there were square earthen beads in others, which seem to be British: in another was a small brass _lar_ about an inch and half long, but much consumed by rust: he told me likewise a pot of Roman money was found at Carlton-scrope near them. There are two fine stone crosses at Newark: the market-place is a spacious square: the church is very large and handsome, with a very high steeple.[95]

_W. Stukeley delin._ a. _Old work Spring._ b. _the Foss_ c. _a
Tumulus_ RR. _the Roman City._ _E. Kirkall Sculp._]

[Sidenote: +Ad Pontem.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. XC.]

From Newark the Foss passes by Queen’s Sconce, one of the great forts erected in the civil wars, and so along the Trent side by Stoke, famous for a battle, and an inn called the Red inn. We arrived, at about six miles distance south of Newark, to the station of the Romans called _Ad pontem_. East Bridgford lies near a mile to the right upon the river Trent: doubtless there was the bridge over the river, which created the denomination, in the Roman times, as being the passage from the eastern parts to those beyond the Trent: and as to this particular station upon the road, perhaps a bridge was the sign of the inn, that travellers might know where to turn out for that purpose, for I cannot suppose here was a bridge at the road. At Bridgford they told us there were formerly great buildings and cellars on the right as you descend to the Trent, and a quay upon the river for vessels to unlade at.[96] The Roman station upon the Foss I found to be called Boroughfield, west of the road: here a spring arises under the hedge, called Oldwork spring, very quick, running over a fine gravel; the only one hereabouts that falls eastward, not directly into the neighbouring Trent, towards Newton. Hereabouts I saw the Roman foundations of walls, and floors of houses, composed after the manner before spoken, of stones set edgewise in clay, and liquid mortar run upon them: there are likewise short oaken posts or piles at proper intervals, some whereof I pulled up with my own hands. Dr. Batteley tells us of oak very firm, found at Reculver, under the Roman cisterns: the earth all around looks very black: they told us that frequently the stones were laid upon a bed of pease-straw and rush-rope or twisted hay, which remained very perfect. Houses stood all along upon the Foss, whose foundations have been dug up, and carried to the neighbouring villages. They told us too of a most famous pavement near the Foss way: close by, in a pasture, Castle-hill close, has been a great building, which they say was carried all to Newark. John Green of Bridgeford, aged 80, told me that he has taken up large foundations there, much ancient coin, and small earthen pipes for water: his father, aged near 100, took up many pipes fourscore yards off the castle, and much fine free-stone: some well cut and carved: there have been found many urns, pots, and Roman bricks; but the people preserved none of them; and some that had coins would by no means let us see them, for fear we were come from the lord of the manor. About a mile farther is a _tumulus_ upon an eminence of the road beyond Bingham lane, a fine prospect to Belvoir castle, Nottingham, the Trent, &c. whence I took a small sketch of the road we had passed, regretting the oblivion of so many famous antiquities.

In my journey forwards, upon the declension of a stiff clayey hill, near the lodge upon the wolds, an inn under a great wood. The pavement upon the road is very manifest, of great blue flag-stones laid edgewise very carefully: the quarries whence they took them are by the side of the hill: this pavement is a hundred foot broad, or more; but all the way thence it has been intirely paved with red flints, seemingly brought from the sea-coasts: these are laid, with the smoothest face upwards, upon a bed of gravel over the clayey marl, which reaches beyond Margidunum; that we may well say,

_O quantæ pariter manus laborant!
Hi cædunt nemus, exuuntque montes.
Hi ferro scopulos trabesque cædunt_, &c. +Stat. Sylv.+ iv.

This pavement is very broad, and visible where not covered with dirt, and especially in the frequent breaches thereof. They preserve a report still, that it was thus paved all the way from Newark to Leicester, and that the Foss way went through Leicester shambles: the yard of the lodge in the wold is paved with these same stones plundered from the road. June 15, 1728, Mr. L. Hurst, of Grantham, told me he saw at Mr. Gascoign’s, a goldsmith in Newark, a large gold ring weighing 42s. lately brought him by a countryman, which he found upon the Foss-way. There was a seal upon the gold; a fox (he thought) engraved under a tree. Afterward I bought the seal: it is a wolf under a tree. Perhaps Norman. AD PONTEM.

[Sidenote: +Margidvnvm.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. XCI.]

Willughby brook is the next water. When arrived over-against Willughby on the wold on the right, Upper and Nether Broughton on the left, you find a _tumulus_ on Willughby side of the road, famous among the country people: it is called Cross hill: upon this they have an anniversary festival: the road parts the two lordships; but the name of Broughton set me to work to find the Roman town, among the people getting in harvest. After some time I perceived I was upon the spot, being a field called Henings, by which I suppose is meant the ancient meadows: this is upon the brow of the hill overlooking Willughby brook, rising in Dalby lordship, and playing in pretty meanders along a valley between corn-fields, with a moderate water unless raised by rains. Here they said had been an old city, called Long Billington: it is often called the Black field in common discourse, from the colour and excessive richness of the soil, so that they never lay any manure upon it. Here is a place called Thieves, and on the other side of the valley a place called Wells, near where now a barn stands: and all this length they say the city reached, and that there was a church on the top of Wells; but the city was mostly on Willughby side; for the land on the other side in Broughton lordship is poor, whilst this is luxuriant to the last degree; so that a farmer once happening to set his sheep-fold here, it rotted the corn upon the spot; and often he has been forced to mow the blade before it spindled (in their way of talking.) The soil is perfectly black, though all the circumjacent land be red, especially north of the valley upon the edge of the hill, and where most antiquities are found; which certainly was the true place, whence the Roman name, signifying a marly hill. Richard Cooper, aged 72, has found many brass and silver coins here: there have been some of gold. They have a notion of great riches being under ground, and a vulgar report that one balk, or mere, (i. e. a division between the ploughed fields) has as much money under it, as would purchase the whole lordship: but people have been frighted from digging it by spirits; and several pleasant stories are told thereupon. They have likewise a tradition that the city was destroyed by _thieves_, perhaps from the place so called. Many Mosaic pavements have been dug up: my landlord Gee of Willughby says, he has upon ploughing met with such for five yards together, as likewise coins, pot-hooks, fire-shovels and the like utensils, and many large brass coins, which they took for weights, ounces and half-ounces, but upon trial found them somewhat less. Broad stones and foundations are frequent upon the side of the Foss: several found at Wells. The ground naturally is so stiff a marl, that at Willughby town they pave their yards with stones, fetched from the Foss way even to the slope of their pits, for the cattle to drink at. At Over and Nether Broughton, and Willughby too, the coins are so frequent, that you hear of them all the country round. There is a fine prospect from Wells hill every way, whence I drew a little view of the place. In Willughby town is a handsome cross of one stone, five yards long: in the time of the reforming rebellion the soldiers had tied ropes about it to pull it down; but the vicar persuaded them to commute for some strong beer, having made an harangue to show the innocence thereof. Richard Cooper likewise told me of a pot of Roman money found at Wilford near Nottingham.

_W. Stukeley delin._ To face +Nether Broughton+ _Kirkall Sculp._]

_Sᵗ. Guthlac’s Cross upon the bank, between Crowland & Spalding,
near Peakill Lineʳ._

_Ivy Cross by Romans bank in Sutton Sᵗ. James Parish Holland
Lincʳ.]_

_The Pedestal of a Cross, Hadenham Cambʳ._

_A Stone Cross found at Sᵗ. John Old Castles near the Barr.
Presented to Lord_ Harley _by Mʳ._ J. Mickleton, _deceased._

_On the Pedestal of a Stone Cross at Drayton near_ Norwich.

_This Cross was at Ednam Lincʳ. drawn by Sʳ._ H. Spelman. Form
Octangular, 9 Inches Diam. 4 Sides twice as broad as the other._

_At Willughby on the Wold, one Stone 5 yards high_

_Stukeley delin:_ _E. Kirkall scu._]

[Sidenote: TAB. XI.]

So much for Margidunum, of which we may say,

_Nunc passim vix relliquias vix nomina servans._

In passing forwards towards Leicester, between here and the river Wrek, I found the Foss road began to be very obscure, not only where it has been ploughed up in some places, but where it goes over a grassy common: the reason is, travellers have quite worn it away, because of the badness of the roads; and the negligence of the people so far from repairing it, that they take away the materials. Moreover, you are oft in danger of losing it through the many intersections of cross roads; and sometimes it is inclosed with pastures, or passes under the sides of a wood: therefore upon every hill-top I made an observation of some remarkable object on the opposite high ground, which continued the right line; so that by going strait forwards I never failed of meeting it again. I observed too, that at such a time of the day exactly, the sun was perpendicular to the road; for it continues the same bearing throughout: this I tried by the compass soon after I left Lincoln, and when I came to High-cross, where it crosses the Watling-street, and at intermediate places; finding it always butted upon the same degree, to surprising exactness. At Abketilby in the vale of Belvoir, and thereabouts, in the quarries is a vein of rag-stone wholly made of shells, covered with a thin vein of good hewing stone: this is in one corner of that great vale, under the Lincolnshire _Alpes_.

[Sidenote: +Shipley-Hill+ Br _barrow_.]

At Cossington (just before I came to the river Wrek, parting the counties) is a vast barrow, 350 foot long, 120 broad, 40 high or near it: it is very handsomely worked up on the sides, and very steep: it seems to have lost some of its length at both ends, especially the northern, a torrent running close by: it stands exactly north and south, upon the very edge of the ings; and in wet times it must be almost incompassed with water: they call it Shipley hill, and say a great captain called Shipley was buried there. I doubt not but this is of great antiquity, and Celtic, and that the intent of it is rightly preserved by the country people; but as to the name of him I can say nothing. On the top are several oblong double trenches cut in the turf, where the lads and lasses of the adjacent villages meet upon Easter-Monday yearly, to be merry with cakes and ale. I observed upon the Foss, all along, that in almost every parish were such like tables, for the same purpose; and such a one I formerly found at Rowldrich stones in Oxfordshire. Near this place, at Radcliff, so called from the road, it seems that the Foss road passes over this brook, and filling up its cavity, made it necessary to cut a new channel, that the road might run strait, and like the Roman _terminus_ give place to nothing. Having passed the river, it proceeds over the meadows: just beyond them is a large round _tumulus_, which I suppose Roman: then the road goes strait through Thumarton, and ends full upon the east gate of Leicester. But before we speak of this station, we must with the Itinerary make an excursion to take in _Vernometum_.

[Sidenote: +Vernometum.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. XXII 2d Vol.]

There seems to be no Roman way between _Ratæ_ and _Vernometum_;[97] but coming from _Margidunum_, you turn out of the road by Sison over-against Radcliffe before mentioned. This place is Borough, or Erdborough, i. e. the earthy camp, in Gartre hundred east of Leicester. It is a very great Roman camp upon a very high hill, the north-west tip of a ridge of hills, and higher than any other part of it, of a most delightful and extensive prospect, reaching as far as Lincoln one way: the fortification takes in the whole summit of the hill; the high rampire is partly composed of vast loose stones piled up and covered with turf: it is of an irregular figure, humouring the form of the ground, nearly a square, and conformed to the quarters of the heavens: its length lies east and west, the narrowest end eastward: it is about 800 foot long, and for the most part there is a ditch besides the rampire, to render the ascent still more difficult to assailants: the entrance is south-west at a corner from a narrow ridge: here two rampires advance inwards, like the sides of a gate, for greater strength: within is a rising hill about the middle, and they say that vaults have been found thereabouts. Antiquarians talk of a temple, which possibly may have been there, and in the time of the Britons: thus the old _Fanum_ of Apollo at Delphos was in a concavity on the top of a hill. The name of _Vernometum_ signifies a sacred plain, as they tell us from authority. It contains about sixteen acres: several springs rise from under the hill on all sides, and I observed the rock thereof is composed intirely of sea-shells: they frequently carry away the stones that form the rampires, to mend the roads with. The town itself is now but a small village. There is another Roman castle southward near Tilton, but not so big as Borough hill: a petrifying spring near it, and a Roman road, as thought, called Long Hedges. I am not without suspicion that the true name is _Verometum_, and must be sought for somewhere near a river.

[Sidenote: +Ratæ+ Coritanorum.]

[Sidenote: TAB. XCII.]

[Sidenote: TAB. LV.]

[Sidenote: TAB. XXIII. 2d Vol.]

[Sidenote: +Rawdikes+ _a_ Br. _cursus_.]

[Sidenote: TAB. XXIV. XXV. XXVI. XXVII. 2d Vol.]

Leicester is the _Ratæ Coritanorum_ of the Romans. The trace of the Roman wall quite round is discoverable without difficulty, especially in the gardens about Senvy gate: there was a ditch on the outside, very visible in the gardens thereabouts: it is 2500 Roman feet long, and as much broad towards the south-east, 2000 Roman feet broad to the north-west: this was repaired by Edelfleda, a noble Saxon lady, anno 914. but the stories in Mr. Camden, of the piles it stood on, and the indissoluble tenacity of the mortar, seem meant of the Roman work. The streets run in the manner we observed of _Camboritum_, the length of the city being from north-west to south-east. There is a Roman musive pavement in a cellar, in part remaining, of a person standing by a deer, Cupid drawing his bow, delineated in differently-coloured small stones as usual.[98] The old work called Jewry wall is composed of rag-stone and Roman brick: several fragments and foundations are in all the houses hereabouts of this building, whatever it were, as well as in the adjacent church, which seems to be built in the very _area_ of it, and out of its ruins. Not far off is a place called Holy Bones, where abundance of bones of oxen have been dug up, the _exuvia_ of their sacrifices: this is however a most noble piece of Roman antiquity, and I lament it should be so much abused. Many Roman coins are found at Leicester: at the entrance into White Friers a pot full dug up about five years ago, and many great foundations. At St. Mary de Pree’s abbey they dug up a body, about three years ago, which they supposed to be cardinal Wolsey’s: in this abbey is nought worth seeing, but a pleasant terrace-walk, supported by an embattled wall, with lunettes hanging over the river and shadowed with trees. The little remains of the old building are new modelled by later hands, and scarce to be distinguished: it was made a dwelling-house since the Dissolution; and that is now spoiled of floors, roof, and windows; and the naked walls are left to daily ruin and pillage: the spot of the abbey is turned into a garden: they show us a place in it, where has been much search for the famous cardinal’s body; but it did not seem to me a likely place. The church, though wholly erased, did not probably come out so far toward the river: indeed there is thorough work made of all the religious houses at Leicester, and scarce one stone left in its original site. St. Margaret’s church was a bishop’s see in the time of the Saxon kings. Within the castle is a collegiate hospital, founded by Henry earl of Lancaster, who with his son Henry duke of Lancaster lie buried in the chapel: the church was very fine, demolished in the Suppression. Here, say some, was buried Richard III. this castle was built by Simon de Montfort. There is a very pretty arch reaching across the river, called Bowbridge, at Black Friers, under which they have a notion that king Richard III. was buried; which seems to allude to the British romance that tells of king Lear being buried here. Half a mile southward from Leicester, upon the edge of the meadows is a long ditch called Rawdikes: upon view of the place I found it to be a British _cursus_. King Charles I. when besieging Leicester, lay at the vicarage-house at Elston; and during the storm of the town, when his men took and pillaged it, he stood, as they report, upon the banks of this Rawdikes. About February 1721–2. a tesselated pavement was found the other side the river, about Wanlip, with coins of Constantine, broken urns, a human scull, &c. a foundation by it, doubtless of the house that covered it.

_Stukeley delin._ _E. Kirkall sculp._

Willᵒ: Cheselden Chirurgo peritissimo, Amico _Tab. dd. W. Stukeley_.

_Key found at Burrow Hill_

_T. Lyus Delin._

_from Revᵈ. G Ashby’s Museolum at Barrow Suffolk. 1791]

Samueli Carte A.M. d.d. W. Stukeley.

_Stukeley delin._]

_Ne tantam Ruinam absorbeat Inimica Ætas aq. forti fecit. Wˢ.
Stukeley & Samⁱ Gale Ar. consecratā voluit. 1722._]

_Stukeley delin_: _E. Kirkall sculp_:]

_Stukeley del._ _I. Vᵈᵉʳ. Gucht Sculp._]

Soon after you go from Leicester, taking the Foss at Bronstongate, you come to some inclosures and troublesome gates across the road: here they have fenced it out into a narrow scantling, scarce the breadth of a coach, to the shame as well as the detriment of the country, suffering so scandalous an incroachment. I travelled by Narborough on the west side of the river, and a very wet journey under foot for one that was resolved to keep upon the road: sometimes I rode half a mile up to the horse’s belly in water upon the Roman pavement. The river Soar running near its east side, it is carried over many bogs, quags, and springs, for miles together, with a visible pavement of great round coggles by Sharnford, so called from the causeway: approaching High-cross it enters inclosures again, and is crossed by some more lakes scarce passable. Just upon the edge of Leicestershire and Warwickshire, at High-cross, I met the Watling-street, my future conductor.

[Sidenote: +Benonis.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. XCIII.]

Benonis stands in the intersection of the two great Roman roads that traverse the kingdom obliquely, and seems to be the centre of England, and highest ground; for from hence rivers run every way. The Foss went across the back-side of the inn, and so towards Bath. The ground hereabouts, the site of the ancient city, is very rich; and many antiquities, stones, Roman bricks, &c. have been dug up: Roman coins were found when they ploughed the field west of the cross.[99] Much _ebulus_ grows here, sought for in cure of dropsies. Claybroke lane has a bit of an old quick-set hedge left across it, betokening one side of the Foss: the bearing of the Foss here is exactly north-east and south-west, as upon the moor on this side Lincoln. In the garden before the inn was a _tumulus_ lately taken away: under it they found the body of a man upon the plain surface, as likewise under several others hereabouts upon the Watling-street. Foundations of houses have been frequently dug up along the street here, all the way to Cleycester. Here is a cross of handsome design, but of a mouldering stone, through the villainy of the architect, one Dunkley, built at the charge of the late earl of Denbigh, and the gentlemen in the neighbourhood: it consists of four Doric columns regarding the four roads, with a gilded globe and cross a-top upon a sun-dial: on two sides, between the four Tuscan pillars, that compose a sort of pedestal, are these inscriptions.

_Vicinarum provinciarum Vervicensis
Scilicet & Leicestrensis ornamenta
Proceres patriciique auspiciis
Illustrissimi Basilii comitis de
Denbigh hanc columnam statuendam
curaverunt in gratam pariter
& perpetuam memoriam Jani tandem
a serenissima Anna clausi._

A. D. MDCCXII.

_Si veterum Romanorum vestigia
quæras, hic cernas viator. Hic enim
celeberrimæ illorum viæ militares
sese mutuo secantes ad extremos usque
Britanniæ limites procurrunt, hic
stativa sua habuerunt Vennones & ad
primum abhinc lapidem castra sua
ad stratam & ad fossam tumulum
Claudius quidam cohortis præfectus
habuisse videtur._

Cloudbury-hill, two thorn-bushes upon a _tumulus_ on the Foss, supposed the sepulchre of one Claudius. The city probably was of a square form, humouring the crossing of the roads, and had consequently four streets and four quarters. Many foundations are dug up along all the roads. It commands a charming prospect to _Ratæ_, _Vernometum_, Coventry, &c. and quite round. You go through a gate by the cross to regain the Foss: at the length of a pasture it meets the true old road.

_Stukeley del_: _I. Vᵈᵉʳ. Gucht Sculp._

_Thomæ Bacon Ar Relliquias Romanas dd. Wˢ. Stukeley._

_Coins found near High-Cross_

High Cross. A.D. 1618.

High Cross, 1722.

_Bonnonis Sept. 9. 1722._]

[Sidenote: +Watling-street.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. LVI.]

Being now got upon the Watling-street, I made this remark of it, that it is the direct road to Rome: for take a ruler, and lay it in a map of Europe from Chester through London and Dover, and it makes a strait line with Rome: so the great founders had this satisfaction when they travelled upon it, that they were ever going upon the line that led to the imperial Capitol. Our antiquarians are much at a loss, after torturing of words and languages, to find out the reason of the name of this street, which is so notorious, that many other by-roads of the Romans, in different parts of the kingdom, have taken the same, and it became almost the common appellative of such roads. My judgment of it is this: it is natural to denominate great roads from the places they tend to, as the Icening-street from the Iceni: the Akeman-street is said to come from Akemancester: in Wiltshire, and other places, the way to Exeter they call the Exeter road, though a hundred mile off: so the London road is every where inquired for as the most remarkable place: thus _Watling-street_, tending directly to Ireland, no doubt was called the Irish road, that is the _Gathelian_ road, _Gathelin-street_; whence our present word _Wales_ from _Gauls_, _warden_ from _guardian_, &c. _Scoti qui & Gaidelii_ says _ogygia extera_. Whether there be any thing in the story of Gathelus, as founder of the Irish, I do not concern myself at present; but their language is called _Gaothela_: so Mr. Camden says the true genuine Scots own not that name, but call themselves _gaoithel_, _gaiothlac_, as coming from Ireland; and that they glory in this name: and there is no dispute but this is the ancient appellative of the Irish,[100] which the learned Mr. Edward Lluyd has turned into _Gwydhelians_: and this name, which has superseded that which the Romans gave it, (whatever it was) seems to show there was such a road in the ancient times of the Britons, as the track of the trade between Ireland and the continent; yet it must be owned nought but Roman hands reduced it to the present form.

Hence-forward we turn our course upon the Gathelin-street directly for London along with the Itinerary. The road is now altogether between hedge-rows, very clayey and bad, full of lakes and mires, through the intolerable negligence of the inhabitants: here and there they have stupidly mended it, by making a ditch in the middle of the road to raise a bank of earth; for which they ought rather to be punished than commended.

I turned out of the road to the west, through some inclosures, to see Cester-over, induced by the name. I found a house in a little square deeply intrenched upon the side of a hill, but the earth rather thrown outward than inward as a _vallum_, and the level within much lower than the field around it. I perceived it was a religious house; some part of the building left; and without the ditch a fine chapel, built of brick with good stone coins and mullioned windows, converted into a barn: and a-cross a valley hard by I saw dams, or stanks, for fish-ponds. The people within could give me no manner of intelligence, having but lately come thither. I fancied it to have been a nunnery, and that it was called _Sister-over_, to distinguish it from other neighbouring towns; as _Church-over_, _Browns-over_, _&c._ but afterwards I learnt from other hands that there is a close called Old-town, where they dig up foundations, being very rich land (said to have been a city) lord Brook possessor.

[Sidenote: +Tripontium.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. XCIV.]

Thence passing a rivulet, from Bensford bridge[101] I came to _Tripontium_, placed in a sweet little valley, but the sides pretty steep: the road on the opposite hill looks perfectly like a perspective scene at the play-house. This is the next Roman station, which is rightly placed at Dovebridge upon the Avon, running by Rugby to Warwick. The stream here divides into two, with a bridge over each: upon one a stone inscription, very laconic, showing the three counties that repair it. The first syllable of _Tripontium_ has relation to the old British word _tre_, a town or fortification: the remainder is generally thought to signify a bridge; but it is not to be imagined the Romans would make a bridge over this rill, or one so eminently large as to denominate the town: indubitably it comes from the British word _pant_, a little valley as this is, and remarkably so; which the Britons pronouncing broad, created the Latin _Tripontium_. Here are no manner of remains of antiquity, but the distances on each hand ascertain this the place: hard by antiquities have been found both at Cathorp and Lilburn, one on the north, the other on the south of the river; so that the Roman city stood on both sides. Castle hills, a place at Lilburn, where are some old walls: Camden speaks of it. Mr. Morton has treated largely on this station, to whom I refer the reader. The neighbouring Newton probably succeeded it, and then Rugby.

Yet rolling Avon still maintains its stream,
Swell’d with the glories of the Roman name.
Strange power of fate, unshaken moles must waste,
While things that ever move for ever last!