wanderings of antiquary

Front matter

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STALKS

Preface

Ir is the object of the little book now offered to the Public, to give in a popular form a few archeological truths relating to this country, which, it is hoped, may tend to foster a love of our national antiquities among those who are less likely to be attracted by dry dissertations. It is the result of various pleasant excursions in different parts of England, alone or in company with several friends of congenial tastes, whose society gave them an additional charm for me, which I would gladly, if I could, communicate to my readers. I have in most cases selected localities remarkable for monuments that are at the same time of great interest themselves and give an opportunity of embodying certain portions of antiquarian knowledge not generally possessed by those who are not professed antiquaries, or at least very generally misunderstood.

In the present volume, the monuments to which I v1 PREFACE.

have chosen to conduct my readers belong chiefly to the Roman or to the British or Early Saxon periods. This, I must state, is partly the result of accident, though I have perhaps also been led to the selection by the circumstance that many of these monuments are very little known in comparison to their extraordinary interest, and that they afford more room for giving popular instruction, and for correcting prejuclices and mistakes, than those of a later period. If I succeed in this object, I shall feel satisfied that my « Wanderings” have been useful to others as well as agreeable to the writer.

I will only add that these sketches have been written at leisure moments during the last two years, and that, in one or two instances, circumstances connected with particular localities described in them have undergone some change during that period, which it is hardly necessary to specify. Thus, I am informed that the “Freehold Land Society,” of which I have spoken at the close of Chapter ILI. as then in possession of an important portion of the site of ancient Verulamium, has since resold that property, but I am not at present aware of its probable destination. Again,

PREFACE. Vii when Chapter VI. was written, I was only able to speak of the paper by the Astronomer Royal on the place of Czesar’s landing in Britain from having heard it read in the crowded room of a society, and therefore imperfectly ; it has since been printed in the Archzologia, and, although my opinion that the views of its author are erroneous remains unchanged, I confess that it deserves a more extended examination than I have been here able to give to it.

It is right to state that the greater part of this volume first appeared in a series of papers under the same title in the Gentleman’s Magazine.

THOMAS WRIGHT.

Brompton, December, 1853.

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Contents

CHAPTER I. The Roman Iron District of the Forest of Dean and its neighbourhood II. The Roman cities on the Welsh borders, Ariconium and Magna .

Iii. Ancient Verulamium .

IV. A visit to the graves of the followers of Hengist and Horsa VY. Sandwich, and the ruins of Rutupize VI. The Kentish coast from Deal to Dymehurch VII. Pevensey Castle 5 4 5 2

Chapter I. The Roman Iron District Of The Forest Of Dean And Its

NEIGHBOURHOOD.

ALL visitors are agreed that Ross is a pretty and an interesting town. Although it cannot be said to possess, as a town, any very remarkable feature, yet there 1s enough in it to attract and please; and, without any great claims in the scenery immediately surrounding it, its prospects are sufficiently picturesque and beautiful to engage the traveller. Yet Ross derives its chief interest from the circumstance that it is the centre of a district which, remarkable for the extreme beauty of its scenery, is at the same time filled with monuments of the old time, and rich in historical reminiscences and traditions. Not more than three miles to the south-eastward, under the commanding heights of Penyard, is traced the site of the Roman city of

B

Ariconium. Ata short distance south from Ross the traveller enters upon the elevated woodlands of the Forest of Dean. Eastward and northward a rich and varied country is filled with early churches, old manor houses, camps, and tumuli, and other traces of the ancient peoples who have occupied the land. But the most beautiful and interesting excursion from Ross is that which carries the visitor down the Wye to Monmouth, and which may be made either by the river or by the road.

At less than a mile from Ross the Wye is crossed by Wilton Bridge, a good structure of the reign of Elizabeth, curious chiefly for the manner in which the stones of the arches are made to lock into one another. Close above the bridge, on the opposite bank of the river, stand, almost buried in trees, the ruims of Wilton Castle, the ancient baronial seat of the Lords Grey de Wilton. Wilton upon Wye is in the parish of Bridstow, the little church of which possesses several points of interest for the ecclesiastical antiquary; while from the ascent of the Hereford road the traveller will obtain one of the best near views of the town of Ross, backed by the hill of Penyard. The road to Monmouth turns off to the left at the turnpike before he ascends the rise of the Hereford road.

For more than a mile the road to Monmouth is uninteresting. It then rises a little and opens to the river, and we obtain in that direction a varying landscape, the chief feature of which is the winding course of the Wye. Look-

GOODRICH COURT. oO ing back, Ross, known by its pointed spire and by its white square hotel (not a very pleasing object in the landscape), and Wilton bridge, are seen in the distunce. A little further we begin to ascend more elevated ground, and when we reach a place called Pencraig the view which presents itself to us is exceedingly fine. ‘To the left the spire of Ross arises in the midst of the woods and hills that surround it; below the river winds its way through a beautiful valley, which has not yet closed in upon it as it does a little further down, while to the right the high promontory which overlooks it is crowned with the noble ruins of Goodrich Castle. Continuing our way from Pencraig, we shortly afterwards turn off into the grounds of Goodrich Court, celebrated for the museum of ancient armour and other antiquities collected there by the late Sir Samuel Rush Meyrick. The museum, especially its collection of carvings in ivory, bequeathed to Sir Samuel by the late Mr. Douce, is well worthy of the careful examination of the visitor. The house itself is a modern castle, built in not very good imitation of several styles, of which it would be difficult to point out any examples in the surrounding country, and presenting somewhat the appearance of a large wooden toy; it is beautifully situated with charming views over the valley of the Wye, but the building itself is in extremely bad taste, and this is felt the more from the contrast with the fine ruins which present themselves on the summit of the adjoining hill. The latter

B 2 are exceedingly interesting, and deserve to be carefully examined for their architectural peculiarities. Goodrich Castle was originally built in the later period of the Saxon monarchy; but the present remains are Norman, with the addition of works of the Edwardian period, finally repaired and adorned in the fifteenth century. Among its peculiarities is the singular prevalence of triangular heads for arches.

The view from Goodrich Castle is superior to any which has hitherto presented itself; and the prospect of the castle from the river below is equally remarkable for its picturesyue grandeur. The wanderer in search of antiquities may visit the remains of Flanesford Priory, which once stood there under the protection of the castle above, and the last remnant of which now serves the humble purposes of a barn.

After leaving Goodrich Castle, the road again turns off from the river, or rather the river turns off from the road, and, as the latter crosses over the high ridge behind, it furnishes a series of extensive views of a different deseription, bounded in the distance by the mountains of Wales. Hence descending to Old Forge, we again come upon the river amid some of the finest of the Wye scenery, at Huntisham Hill, on the opposite side of the Wye, which is covered with large detached blocks of stone, and presents a very remarkable appearance. While we have thus been following the road to Monmouth, the river itself has made

MONMOUTH. )

a long sweep of several miles, winding between lofty hills, sometimes rising gradually and covered with thick hanging woods, and at others breaking into rocky precipices. Towards the south may be seen glimpses of the wild country of the Forest of Dean. Further on, the river passes beneath the narrow precipitous rock of Symond’s Yat (7. e. Gate), and then discloses a new series of magnificent views, till it reaches the wild scenery of the New Weir, where the stream, confined in its channel, becomes extremely rapid. From Whitchurch the road we have been pursuing runs again from the river behind two hills called the Great and Little Dowards, till we come once more in sight of the Wye, and our road then continues in a course almost parallel to its banks, under wooded heights on the right, and on the left with fine views over the river in one direction through the valley in which it winds its course under the Dowards, and in the other through masses of wooded hills which skirt its banks, until it approaches Monmouth.

It would not be easy to point out a more beautiful situation for a town than that of Monmouth. It stands at a bend of the river Wye, where it is joined by the Monnow, in a fertile valley surrounded by high hills, which looks, from the road up the Kymin, like a green carpet raised up at numerous corners, with the town in the bottom. Monmouth is believed by antiquaries to stand on or near the site of the ancient Blestium, a town of the Romans which oO BO occupied the borders of the great Roman iron-works of the Forest of Dean; and the ordinary traveller, as he treads the route which we have been following, and dwells on its picturesque beauties, little thinks that some fifteen centuries ago many of the bright cornfields and thick leafy copses which now arrest his eye were represented by bare hills covered with immense heaps of black cinders—in fact the Dudley and Birmingham of Roman Britain.

It was this circumstance which particularly attracted our attention in a recent visit to this beautiful district, and when we had reached Monmouth, instead of continuing on the beaten track of what is called “the Wye tour,” we prepared for an excursion to the most interesting part of the Roman iron district, the neighbourhood of Coleford. The carriage of a friend carried us over the Wye bridge, and we pursued the road which winds through the thick mass of oak and hazel, mixed here and there with birch and mountain ash and other trees, and adorned in variegated colours with a multitude of ferns and wild-flowers, which clothe the side of the Kymin mountain. Behind us the view stretched over the vale of Monmouth, and before us was at first the scenery of the banks of the Wye through which we had previously passed, and, as we advanced further, the Buckstone and other hills, their sides. covered with masses of hanging woods unequalled on this side the Appenines. We soon turned the head of a deep ravine, and the road began to ascend still higher up to the side of the Buck-

THE BUCKSTONE.

stone itself. This lofty hill takes its name from one of those remarkable objects called rocking-stones, which stands within the wood at the top. With another of our party, I left the carriage about half way up the hill, and, assisted with those weapons which neither antiquary nor geologist should be without on such occasions, we forced our way upwards through the closely matted underwood, with considerable labour and time, halting from time to time to admire a wild flower or regale ourselves with the ripe bilberries with which the ground was covered. At last we reached the summit, and found ourselves at the verge of the wood, on open ground, scattered with fern and furze bushes, and covered with wild thyime and large. patches of purple heath, then in full bloom. This open ground sloped towards Gloucestershire, and afforded a magnificent view over the series of wooded hills which form the Forest of Dean. We had, however, missed the Buckstone, and we had to follow the edge of the wood, and thence force our way into it again, before we reached the object of our search.

If I could bring myself to believe that masses of rock like this were so placed by the hands of ancient Druids, I should conclude that never was a grander spot chosen for the performance of their superstitious worship than that occupied by the Buckstone. It stands near the top of the hill, in a small open space, so that it is visible from a distance, with a magnificent amphitheatre of lofty hills, generally covered with wood, around, and the deep valley of the Wye hundreds of feet below. But the geologists have taught me, and my own observations have certainly led me to believe them, that we owe the rocking-stones to natural causes, and that they are not artificial Our excursion up the Kymin afforded us a practical confirmation of this. In the midst of the wood we observed here and there numerous masses of the same stone, gomeg through the process of being made into rocking-stones. The rock itself ranges through most of the hills from Penyard hither, and is that which is known as the old red conglomerate, composed of quartz pebbles in a sandy matrix, very unequally hardened, so that, under the influence of the weather, it disintegrates into large irregular shaped blocks, such as are seen on the sides of Huntisham Hill, mentioned before, and are of frequent occurrence in other places. We met with more than one example where a little more clearing with some accidental circumstances would have produced as perfect a rocking-stone as the Buckstone itself. The latter consists of a mass of rock of a pyramidal form, nearly sixty feet in circumference, supported on its apex. The point on which it rests is about three feet round. Fosbroke tell us, in his “ Wye Tour,” that he thought upon trial he “ could just perceive it move.” It did not appear to me capable of doing so. I remained long enough to make a hasty sketch of it, from which the accompanying engraving is taken, and then we

THE BUCKSTONE, NEAR MONMOUTH.

THE SCOWLES. Ss)

erossed the open heath and descended on the other side of the mountain to the picturesque village of Staunton, where we rejoined our friends, who had proceeded thither in the carriage by the road round the margin of the Buckstone hill.

We were now in Gloucestershire, within the limits of the Forest of Dean, and alittle more than two miles would have brought us to the small town of Coleford. Instead, however, of proceeding thither, we turned off along a bye-road to an old farm-house called the Scowles farm. This place, which also stands on high ground, receives its name from the numerous remains of Roman iron-mines around it, which are known by the popular appellation of the Scowles; a name which I cannot explain. The ground occupied by the mines or Scowles, having, from its unevenness, been left uncultivated, is always covered with thick copses, and it is necessary to be careful in entering them, lest we fall unawares into the entrances to the ancient mines. These entrances are formed as follows. A large round pit or hollow in the earth—one we entered was from twenty to thirty feet in diameter and about twenty feet in depth—was sunk till the miners arrived at a vein of the iron ore, which they then worked into the earth as far as they could follow it. As they now remain, we find at the bottom of the pit just mentioned, on one side, an aperture resembling the entrance to a large low oven. Into this we entered a few feet in the dark—we unfortunately had no lights—and then finding it somewhat clogged up with the accumulation of earth at the mouth, and considering it not very safe to pass further, we contented ourselves with throwing a stone, which we could distinctly hear rolling down for some seconds, so that it was evidently deep. The cottagers in the neighbourhood told us that some of these mines went two or three hundred feet under ground, and that they descended into them with lanterns, and obtained very pure water at the bottom.

The ore, or, as the workmen call it, mine, found here is of fibrous appearance, so rich in metal that i¢ sometimes looks almost like pure iron, and it is still picked up so abundantly about the old Roman mines, that it is found everywhere built into the rough walls surrounding the cottage gardens. The antiquity of these mines is proved by the circumstance that Roman coins and pottery have frequently been picked up about them. Indeed we find these proofs of Roman occupation thickly scattered over this district. Some four or five years ago, workmen employed in raising blocks of silicious grit stone from an edge of rock in a small oak copse called Perry Grove, about a mile from Coleford, discovered in the cavity of a rock three earthen vessels containing upwards of three thousand Roman brass coins.

On the ground between this place and the Wye we still find immense quantities of iron scorie or cinders from

A ROMAN ROAD. dal the Roman works. On leaving the Scowles we drove along the way to Redbrook. The road descended between hills, now clad in woods, but which also were covered with a deep layer of Roman cinders. Some of these are known by names which indicate their former condition, such as Forge Wood and Old Hill. In the valley between these hills a small but rapid stream descends, by the side of which our road lay. At one point of this stream, an ingenious speculator has taken advantage of it to erect a machine, of a very simple construction, which, worked by the current, reduces to powder the ancient scorie that are thrown into it, and this powder is carried down to Bristol, where it is used for making coarse glass bottles. At Upper Redbrook we again reached the banks of the Wye, below Monmouth, and, having sent our carriage back to that town, we prepared to cross the river by the ferry-boat established here. The cinders in the ground around had apparently increased in quantity as we approached the river, and at the edge of the water at Upper Redbrook ferry they lay under our feet like pebbles on the sea-shore.

The view on the river was again fine. On the Redbrook side it was bordered with hills covered with wood, while opposite rose the less wooded but more elevated hill of Penalt. The ferry at Upper Redbrook is no doubt of remote antiquity. When we landed at the foot of Penalt, we came upon an ancient road, which I have little doubt is Roman; it is paved with stones, like flags, carefully fitted together, but of all shapes and sizes, and proceeds directly up the steep side of the hill, and one of my friends well acquainted with the neighbourhood assures me that he had traced it as much as five miles in the direction of Tintern and Chepstow. It looks as though it were designed for pack-horses, carrying charcoal and other articles to and from the neighbourhood of Coleford. Another friend, who has resided in this district during many years, tells me that he remembers the same road continued on the Redbrook side of the river, and paved in a similar manner. Near the top of Penalt, we turned off through the solitary churchyard, over the hill, whence we again obtained a noble prospect of the vale of Monmouth, and so descending by Troy House, an old seat of the Herberts, built by Inigo Jones, and now belonging to the Duke of Beaufort, reached Monmouth again to a late but truly hospitable dinner. There can be little doubt that the furnaces which produced the immense quantity of scorie that cover the country round Redbrook were fed with the ore from the neighbouring Scowles. The Scowles we visited are in the mountain limestone, which skirts the coal field: of the Forest of Dean. The Great and Little Dowards are capped by this rock, resting on old red sandstone, and it is in the mountain limestone that the iron ore is here found, and it probably furnished no inconsiderable portion of the cinders which are spread so thickly over the country to the north of the Wye between Monmouth and Bridstow. Onthe side

2 iff x

KING ARTHUR'S HALL, GREAT DOWARD.

KING ARTHUR’S HALL. 13 of the Great Doward is still seen the entrance to one of the ancient iron mines, to which tradition has given the name of King Arthur’s Hall. There were no doubt old legends which connected the spot with the history of the fabulous British hero, and some of our topographers have alluded to them without condescending to give them a place in their works; but our English peasantry are beginning to feel a sort of reluctance to repeat such legends to those who they think belong to a better informed class of society, and all that we can now obtain from them is that the caverns to which this is the entrance are said to have been resorted to

“in the troubled times,” and that it is confidently believed that a great chest full of treasure is concealed in the bottom of one of them. The accompany‘ng sketch represents the entrance to King Arthur’s Hall. It is, in fact, the entrance (or entrances) to an extensive series of chambers which have been made by the extraction of the iron ore, and which at present are much clogged up near the mouth, but they are said to extend to a very great depth underground. Iam told that within the last twenty years a considerable quantity of iron “ mine” has been obtained at a few hundred yards from this place, and much of it still remains in heaps not far from the banks of the Wye, in the wood above New Weir.*

* T am informed that the ruined walls at the New Weir are the remains of works of quite a modern date, in existence and full operation within the present century.

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The district of the Dowards lies in the bend of the river between Whitchurch and Ganarew. On the boundary where these two parishes join, in a meadow on the right hand of the road to Monmouth, where the surface presents considerable inequality, I am informed that traces of a Roman villa have been found, but it has not been explored. At Lydbrook, a little further up the river, a large quantity of Roman coins were found in the beginning of 1848 by some men quarrying sandstone. Those which were preserved and examined were chiefly of Gallienus, Victorinus, and Claudius. Gothicus. Nearer to Goodrich, on Copped-Wood hill, about the year 1817, a large collection of coins of the lower empire was dug up. The name of Walford, which is borne by the village on the river below Goodrich castle, seems to indicate the existence of perhaps Roman buildings adjacent to the ford, which in Saxon times may have taken its name from the walls that remained. The cinders occur very abundantly about Whitchurch and Goodrich; they are strewed over the surface of the fields, and if we dig a very little depth we find in many places a thick and apparently a deep bed of them. They are found in the fields on both sides of the road till we arrive at Weir End, in the parish of Bridstow, where they are abundant by the river side. They occur also in many places in the same parish. The antiquity of these cinders is proved not only by the coins and broken pottery found among them, but by the cireum-

ROMAN IRON SCORLZ. 145)

stance that there is scarcely anywhere a trace of any buildings connected with them; and it is worth observing, that very considerable deposits, if not the greatest known, occupy sites where there was no opportunity of water being made available as a moving power. In the parish of Peterstow there is a little valley running down from the farm called the Flann, behind the church, in which cinders are found, and here a little stream was available; but the most remarkable deposit remained at Cinder Grove (also in the parish of Peterstow) within the last fifty or sixty years, from which many thousand tons were subsequently removed for the purpose of re-smelting. The site occupies a field of several acres, distinguishable from all around by its rich black mould, abounding with ciaders, with traces of charcoal sticking in and incorporated with them. I was shown two coins in good condition, one of which was of the Emperor Philip (a.p. 244-249). To the east of Ross, on the opposite side from Bridstow, immense masses of Roman scoriz are found at Weston under Penyard, the site of the Roman town of Ariconium, which must have been a city of iron-workers, and surrounded by forges. I am told that the floors of some of the forges have been discovered. Many of the cinders I gathered at this spot appeared to me to be of a lighter kind than those I had observed in other places, so that it might be here that the iron went through the last process of preparation,

' which I believe is now called the finery. I have not been

Ce2 able to ascertain how far to the north of the river the beds of cimders extend; but they are seen plentifully in the parish of Tretire, where also, to my knowledge, one Roman coin at least has been found. Cinders occur likewise in abundance in the parishes of Llangarran, Hentland, and St. Weonards. :

In the diminutive but very old church of Tretire I met with one of the most curious memorials I had yet seen of the Roman occupation of this district, perhaps one of the most remarkable monuments of its kind in the country. The sequestered village of Tretire is the residence of a well-known and excellent antiquary, the Rev. John Webb, F.S.A., to whose care we owe the preservation of this monument, which is represented in the accompanying cut. The small parish of Tretire contains two churches, from one of which, called Michael church, this article, which, in its present form, has been a holy-water stoup, was taken some years ago, when the church was repaired. Mr. Webb informs me that he had one day observed it lying at the door of a cottage inhabited by the clerk, and on inquiry learnt that it had been kept behind the church door time out of mind as an article of no use, except to the village doctress, who was skilled in preparing simples, and oceasionally took it out when she wanted to pound her herbs. She used it in fact as a mortar. Mr. Webb imagined at first that it was the rude capital of a pillar, having a square hole cut in the top, and he thought he

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ROMAN ALTAR USED AS A STOUP, TRETIRE CHURCH.

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A ROMAN ALTAR. Zi perceived the remains of the shaft below; but on nearer inspection he saw that it had an inscription on the front, and as he conjectured at once that it had been used as a stoup for holy-water at» the entrance of the church, he caused it to be removed for security to Tretire, where it now stands in the north corner of the chancel on the right hand of the communion table. It had been broken, and the upper part only was first found, but Mr. Webb subsequently discovered the other part, and the two have been now properly joined together.*

It has been hitherto supposed by those who had seen this monument, that the inscription was a Christian dedication, and they read the first words—the latter part of as DEO TRIVNI; but I the first line has been chipped away: think it would not be easy to point out an example of this formula in a Christian inscription of the middle ages. To those well acquainted with this particular class of antiquities this monument presents the unmistakeable characteristics of a Roman altar. The inscription must be read as follows :— DEO TRIY<<7 «

The mutilation of the name of the deity is unfortunate,

* The dimensions of this altar, in its present form of a stoup, are: -the entire height, rather more than 29 inches; length of the shaft, 17 inches; circumference of the shaft, 30 inches; width at the top, but the most probable conjecture seems to me to be that which explains it as Deo Trivii, to the god of the crossroads. There were among the ancients many deities who presided over the roads, and it is very natural that in such a district as this the roads should be placed under their protection. I think I have read of an inscription to a DEO BIVIl; at Mayence, as we are informed by Mr. Roach Smith in his Collectanea Antiqua, there is an altar dedicated to the Bivii, Trivii, and Quadrivii, that is, to the deities who presided over those descriptions of roads, by a centurion of the twenty-second legion; and another GENO DEVH, to the god who presided over the bye-ways; and an altar was found at Gretabridge, in Yorkshire, dedicated DEO QVI VIAS ET SEMITAS COMMENTYS Est. Dedit aram and donavit aram, are usual forms of dedication of Roman altars; an instance is given in Gruter (vol. i. p. dexvii. No. 2), in which both are combined, dedit donavitgue. Some ecclesiastic of the middle ages, in want of material for a holy-water stoup, found this altar, and caused it to be cut into its present form, and the workman, caring little for the inscription, erased the final m of the word aram, and the latter letters of the name of the divinity to whom it was dedicated, with his tool. I think it is the only instance in this country where a Roman altar has thus been adopted for any 15 inches, by 7 inches across; width and breadth of the base, 164 inches, by 10, At the top there are two straight grooves, one on each side the basin which has heen cut into the altar,