THE reasons I have to address the following journey to you, are both general and particular: of the first sort, the title affixed to it could not but put me in mind of your claim to these kind of disquisitions from any hand, whose excellent commentary on Antoninus’s Itinerary has deservedly given you the palm of ancient learning, and rendered your character classic among the chief restorers of the Roman Britain. But I am apprehensive it will be easier to make these papers of mine acceptable to the world, than to yourself, both as the most valuable part of them is your own, and as I purpose by it to remind you of favouring the public with a new edition of that work, to which I know you have made great additions; and in this I am sure they will join with me. The honour you have indulged me of a long friendship, the pleasure and advantage I have reaped in travelling with you, and especially a great part of this journey, are particular reasons, or rather a debt from myself and the world, if any thing of antique inquiries I can produce that are not illaudable, if what time I spend in travelling, may not be wholly a hunting after fresh air with the vulgar citizens, but an examination into the works of nature, and of past ages. I have no fears, that aught here will be less acceptable to you, because perhaps in some things I may differ from your sentiments: the sweetness of your disposition, and your great judgement, I know, will discern and applaud what is really just, and excuse the errors: difference of opinions, though false, is often of great service in furthering a discovery of the truth: to think for one’s self is the prerogative of learning; and no one, but a tyrant in books, will persecute another for it. It is certain, Antoninus his Itinerary is an endless fund of inquiry. I doubt not but in future researches I shall be induced as much to vary from myself as now from others; and, after our best endeavours, succeeding writers will correct us all.
The last summer I travelled this whole Seventh Journey, and in the order of the Itinerary; but I took in several other places by the way, which relate to the clearing some parts of other journeys. Parallel to the great Icening-street, runs another Roman road from south-west to north-east, through London, beginning at the sea-coast in Hampshire by Rumsey, and ending at the sea-coast in Suffolk about Aldborough. The name of it is utterly lost: if I might have the liberty of assigning one, it should be via Trinovantica, as it tends to the country of those people; and names are necessary to avoid confusion. The lower part of it, or that comprehended between London and Ringwood upon the edge of Dorsetshire, is the subject of this journey; but because I have already given an account of several towns that relate to the XIIIth and XIVth journeys of Antoninus, which have some connexion with this, and that I conceive they are considerably faulty in the original, I shall run through some few more I had opportunity to see, and offer my conjectures towards the restitution of those journeys.
Upon the great moor between Bagshot and Okingham, near East-Hamsted park, we saw a large camp upon a hill doubly ditched, commonly called Cæsar’s camp, as many more without any reason: there has been a well in it, and both Roman and British coins have been found there, one of Cunobelin in silver: its figure is not regular, but conformable to the top of the hill: near it are two large barrows, Ambury and Edgebury. At Berkham by Okingham I bought a very elegant British coin of gold, dug up by a woman in her garden: it is of the most ancient kind, and without letters. I saw a British gold coin found near Old Windsor; another dug up, 1719, at Hanmer hill, between Guildford and Farnham.
All the country hereabouts, and to Silchester, is clay, moor, sand, gravel by spots, much boggy, springy land, much good land, but more bad: the water is blackish every where. Silchester is a place that a lover of antiquity will visit with great delight: it stands upon the highest ground thereabouts, but hid with wood, which grows very plentifully all about it. Many were the Roman roads that met here, though now scarce any road; which is the reason it is so little known: it is likewise inconvenient for travellers, because no inns are near it; and it may be serviceable to tell the curious, that Aldermaston is the nearest town where lodging is to be found, three miles off; for at the place we may truly say,
The walls of this city are standing, more or less perfect, quite round; perhaps the most intire of any in the Roman empire, especially the whole north side of the wall, which is a most agreeable sight. The composition is chiefly flint for the space of four foot high, then a binding of three layers of rag-stone laid flat: in many places five of these double intervals remain for a great length. There was a broad ditch quite round, and now for the most part impassable, and full of springs. Here and there Roman bricks are left in the walls. Though on the out-side they are of this considerable height, yet the ground within is so raised as nearly to be equal to the top, and that quite round crowned with oaks and other timber-trees of no mean bulk, and which Mr. Camden takes notice of in his time. Not long since, lady Blessington cut 500l. worth of timber from thence. Gildas says, Constantius the son of Constantine the Great built it, and sowed corn in the track of the walls, as an omen of their perpetuity:[135] indeed, now the whole city is arable; and among the fields Roman bricks, bits of pots, rubbish of buildings, are scattered every where, and coins are picked up every day. It is a parallelogram whose shortest side to the longest is as 3 to 4; its length about 2600 feet, its breadth 2000; standing conformable to the four cardinal points: it had two gates upon its length opposite. There is only one farm-house within it, and the church. To the east, by that house, the foundation of the gate is visible, and several Roman bricks thereabouts. All the yards here are like a solid rock, with rubbish, pavements and mortar, cemented together. The late Rev. Mr. Betham, minister of this place, a learned, curious and worthy person, had collected a vast number of coins and antiquities found here: he is buried under the north wall of the chancel without side: within is another monument of a person of quality: it is remarkable that a wall only divides them in their graves, who both met a sad and disastrous fate at different times in the same place, being drowned in Fleet-ditch. Onion-hole, in the middle of the southern wall, is a place much talked of here by the ignorant country people, which is only an arch in the foundation for the issue of a sewer: they have a like story here of this city being taken by sparrows. I saw a silver coin of Philippus, and a brass one of Constantine, and many more. A spring arises from under the wall at the church-yard. The streets are still visible in the corn. Rings with stones in them are often found, among inscriptions and all sorts of other antiquities.
Five hundred foot without the city, on the north-east corner I espied another great curiosity, which the people think was a castle: I presently discerned it to be an amphitheatre: it is in bulk, in shape, and all points, the same as that at Dorchester, but not built of so solid materials; for it is chiefly clay and gravel: it stands in a yard by the road side, near a ruinous house and barn, upon a sloping piece of ground: eastward toward the road there is a pit: there it is sixty foot high on the out-side. The whole area or arena within is now covered with water, but they say it is not much above three foot deep: the bottom of it, and the work, must certainly be exceeding solid, and well compared, to retain the water so many years without draining through: it is a most noble and beautiful concave, but intirely over-grown with thorn-bushes, briars, holly, broom, furze, oak and ash trees, &c. and has from times immemorial been a yard for cattle, and a watering-pond; so that it is a wonder their trampling has not defaced it much more. I examined this fine antiquity with all the exactness possible: the terrace at top, the circular walk, the whole form, is not obscure: it is posited exactly as that before described, with its longest diameter from north-east to south-west; its entrance north-east, though farthest from the city. There is an ascent to it from the entrance side, that being upon the lowest ground: at the upper end, the level of the ground is not much below the top of the terrace, and vastly above that of the arena; so that I conceive the better sort of the people went that way directly from the city into their seats: there is such a gap too in that part, from the ruin of the cave where the wild beasts were kept. An old house standing there with an orchard has forwarded its ruin from that quarter; and they have levelled some part of the terrace for their garden. Surveying the whole could not but put me in mind of that piece of Roman magnificence, when the emperors caused great trees to be taken up by the roots, and planted in the amphitheatres and circs, pro tempore, to imitate forests wherein they hunted beasts; which here is presented in pure nature.
Riding along the road on the north side of Silchester, I left it with this reflection: Now a person of a moderate fortune may buy a whole Roman city, which once half a kingdom could not do; and a gentleman may be lord of the soil where formerly princes and emperors commanded. To the west of the place, but at some distance, runs a high bank overgrown with trees seemingly north and south: they say there is another such, south of the city: which would make one suspect they were raised by some besiegers. Farther on I crossed a great Roman road coming from Winchester: they call it Long-bank and Grimesdike. I have very often found this name applied to a road, a wall, a ditch of antiquity; which would make one fancy it is a Saxon word signifying the witches work; for the vulgar generally think these extraordinary works made by help of the devil. They told me it goes through Burfield and Reading. Towards Winchester I could see it as far as the horizon, perfectly strait, ten miles off. We may say with the poet,
Near it they talk of a stone thrown by an imp from Silchester walls, a mile off, which I suppose a mile-stone. Mr. Camden says a Roman road runs westward from Silchester, which I imagine goes to Andover. From Aldermaston is a fine view of the country hanging over the Kennet, lately made navigable. Going from Aldermaston to Kingsclere, where once was a palace of the Saxon kings, I passed over Brimpton common: here are many very fine Celtic barrows:Barrows Br. the soil is a moor full of erica, which they dig up for fewel; underneath it is sand: at Kingsclere the mighty chalk-hills begin. Upon the top of a very high promontory is a square Roman camp, in a park. From hence to Andover is an hard way and open country. Just before I descended the continuation of this great ridge of hills overlooking Andover, I crossed a ditch like Wansditch, hanging upon the edge of the hills, which I suppose some division among the ancient Britons: it extended itself both ways as far as I could see: the foss is not very large, though the bank is: the foss is northward.
Andover is (not to be questioned) the Andaoreon of Ravennas: the name signifies the watery habitation; annedh, habitatio; dur, aqua. It stands on the slope of a hill just by the springs of the river Tees, or t’isca: they arise here northward of the town very plentiful, and are carried in a thousand rills through all the meadows, till they unite and pass under the bridge. The church is an aukward old building; the west door, of an ancient circular make. They are now pulling down the timber market-house to build a new one of stone: the market-place is a broad street. Upon a very high hill to the south-west is a large Roman camp, seeming to be admirably well fortified: it is called Bury-hill Ro. Camp.Bury hill. Between this and Stockbridge is Dunbury hill, a circular camp, doubly intrenched with various works at the entrance.
I travelled along a fine downy country, ’till passing the river Bourn in Wiltshire I came to the Icening-street near Haradon hill; where I intended to observe the great eclipse of the sun, which was to be on the next day; of which memorable phænomenon I judge it will not be disagreeable if I repeat what I wrote of it.
ACCORDING to my promise, I send you what I observed of the solar eclipse, though I fear it will not be of any great use to you. I was not prepared with any instruments for measuring time, or the like, and proposed to myself only to watch all the appearances that Nature would present to the naked eye on so remarkable an occasion, and which generally are overlooked, or but grosly regarded. I chose for my station a place called Haradon hill, two miles eastward from Amsbury, and full east from the opening of Stonehenge avenue, to which it is as the point of view. Before me lay the vast plain where that celebrated work stands, and I knew that the eclipse would appear directly over it: beside, I had the advantage of a very extensive prospect every way, this being the highest hill hereabouts, and nearest the middle of the shadow. Full west of me, and beyond Stonehenge, is a pretty copped hill, like the top of a cone lifting itself above the horizon: this is Clay hill, near Warminster, twenty miles distant, and near the central line of darkness, which must come from thence; so that I could have notice enough before-hand of its approach. Abraham Sturgis and Stephen Ewens, both of this place and sensible men, were with me. Though it was very cloudy, yet now and then we had gleams of sun-shine, rather more than I could perceive at any other place around us. These two persons looking through smoaked glasses, while I was taking some bearings of the country with a circumferentor, both confidently affirmed the eclipse was begun; when by my watch I found it just half an hour after five: and accordingly from thence the progress of it was visible, and very often to the naked eye; the thin clouds doing the office of glasses. From the time of the sun’s body being half covered, there was a very conspicuous circular iris round the sun, with perfect colours. On all sides we beheld the shepherds hurrying their flocks into fold, the darkness coming on; for they expected nothing less than a total eclipse, for an hour and a quarter.
When the sun looked very sharp, like a new moon, the sky was pretty clear in that spot: but soon after a thicker cloud covered it; at which time the iris vanished, the copped hill before mentioned grew very dark, together with the horizon on both sides, that is, to the north and south, and looked blue; just as it appears in the east at the declension of day: we had scarce time to tell ten, when Salisbury steeple, six mile off southward, became very black; the copped hill quite lost, and a most gloomy night with full career came upon us. At this instant we lost sight of the sun, whose place among the clouds was hitherto sufficiently distinguishable, but now not the least trace of it to be found, no more than if really absent: then I saw by my watch, though with difficulty, and only by help of some light from the northern quarter, that it was six hours thirty-five minutes: just before this the whole compass of the heavens and earth looked of a lurid complexion, properly speaking, for it was black and blue; only on the earth upon the horizon the blue prevailed. There was likewise in the heavens among the clouds much green interspersed; so that the whole appearance was really very dreadful, and as symptoms of sickening nature.
Now I perceived us involved in total darkness, and palpable, as I may aptly call it: though it came quick, yet I was so intent that I could perceive its steps, and feel it as it were drop upon us, and fall on the right shoulder (we looking westward) like a great dark mantle, or coverlet of a bed, thrown over us, or like the drawing of a curtain on that side: and the horses we held in our hands were very sensible of it, and crouded close to us, startling with great surprise. As much as I could see of the men’s faces that stood by me, had a horrible aspect. At this instant I looked around me, not without exclamations of admiration, and could discern colours in the heavens; but the earth had lost its blue, and was wholly black. For some time, among the clouds, there were visible streaks of rays, tending to the place of the sun as their centre; but immediately after, the whole appearance of the earth and sky was intirely black. Of all things I ever saw in my life, or can by imagination fancy, it was a sight the most tremendous.
Toward the north-west, whence the eclipse came, I could not in the least find any distinction in the horizon between heaven and earth, for a good breadth, of about sixty degrees or more; nor the town of Amsbury underneath us, nor scarce the ground we trod on. I turned myself round several times during this total darkness, and remarked at a good distance from the west on both sides, that is, to the north and south, the horizon very perfect; the earth being black, the lower part of the heavens light: for the darkness above hung over us like a canopy, almost reaching the horizon in those parts, or as if made with skirts of a lighter colour; so that the upper edges of all the hills were as a black line, and I knew them very distinctly by their shape or profile: and northward I saw perfectly, that the interval of light and darkness in the horizon was between Martinsal hill and St. Ann’s hill; but southward it was more indefinite. I do not mean that the verge of the shadow passed between those hills, which were but twelve miles distant from us: but so far I could distinguish the horizon; beyond it, not at all. The reason of it is this: the elevation of ground I was upon gave me an opportunity of seeing the light of the heavens beyond the shadow: nevertheless this verge of light looked of a dead, yellowish and greenish colour: it was broader to the north than south, but the southern was of a tawny colour. At this time, behind us or eastward toward London, it was dark too, where otherwise I could see the hills beyond Andover; for the foremost end of the shadow was past thither: so that the whole horizon was now divided into four parts of unequal bulk and degrees of light and dark: the part to the north-west, broadest and blackest; to the south-west, lightest and longest. All the change I could perceive during the totality, was that the horizon by degrees drew into two parts, light and dark; the northern hemisphere growing still longer, lighter, and broader, and the two opposite dark parts uniting into one, and swallowing up the southern enlightened part.
As at the beginning the shade came feelingly upon our right shoulders, so now the light from the north, where it opened as it were: though I could discern no defined light or shade upon the earth that way, which I earnestly watched for; yet it was manifestly by degrees, and with oscillations, going back a little, and quickly advancing further; till at length upon the first lucid point appearing in the heavens, where the sun was, I could distinguish pretty plainly a rim of light running along-side of us a good while together, or sweeping by at our elbows from west to east. Just then, having good reason to suppose the totality ended with us, I looked on my watch, and found it to be full three minutes and a half more: now the hill-tops changed their black into blue again, and I could distinguish a horizon where the centre of darkness was before: the men cried out, they saw the copped hill again, which they had eagerly looked for: but still it continued dark to the south-east; yet I cannot say that ever the horizon that way was undistinguishable: immediately we heard the larks chirping and singing very briskly for joy of the restored luminary, after all things had been hushed into a most profound and universal silence: the heavens and earth now appeared exactly like morning before sun-rise, of a greyish cast, but rather more blue interspersed; and the earth, as far as the verge of the hill reached, was of a dark green or russet colour.
As soon as the sun emerged, the clouds grew thicker, and the light was very little amended for a minute or more, like a cloudy morning slowly advancing. After about the middle of the totality, and so after the emersion of the sun, we saw Venus very plainly, but no other star. Salisbury steeple now appeared. The clouds never removed, so that we could take no account of it afterward, but in the evening it lightened very much. I hasted home to write this letter; and the impression was so vivid upon my mind, that I am sure I could, for some days after, have wrote the same account of it, and very precisely. After supper I made a drawing of it from my imagination, upon the same paper I had taken a prospect of the country before.
I must confess to you, that I was (I believe) the only person in England that regretted not the cloudiness of the day, which added so much to the solemnity of the sight, and which imcomparably exceeded, in my apprehension, that of 1715, which I saw very perfectly from the top of Boston steeple in Lincolnshire, where the air was very clear: but the night of this was more complete and dreadful. There indeed I saw both sides of the shadow come from a great distance, and pass beyond us to a great distance; but this eclipse had much more of variety and majestic terror: so that I cannot but felicitate myself upon the opportunity of seeing these two rare accidents of nature, in so different a manner: yet I should willingly have lost this pleasure for your more valuable advantage of perfecting the noble theory of the celestial bodies, which last time you gave the world so nice a calculation of; and wish the sky had now as much favoured us for an addition to your honour and great skill, which I doubt not to be as exact in this as before.Ambsbury, Wilts, May 10, 1724.
Return we to matters of antiquity. Upon this very hill-top are great pits dug lately by order of my lord Charlton for clay, which they find here of a very stiff sort, by nature let in like veins among clefts of the solid chalk: the workmen here, whilst they have been busy in taking it up, have found many Romans coins, silver and brass, some very deep in the earth, as they say; several of which I have now by me. I saw likewise a very fair gold Constantius; the reverse, two Genii holding a shield, vot. xxx. victoria Augg. It seems as if the Romans, with their wonted sagacity, had been occupied here in the same way, to make pottery ware, and not neglected to leave proof of it according to their method. I took notice likewise of one side of the summit being covered with oyster-shells loose upon the surface; and how they came there I could get no information.
The Icening-street runs between this hill and the Bourn river, coming from Newberry, as I suppose, through Chute forest, where vulgarly called Chute causeway: at Lurgishal it makes a fine terrace-walk in the garden of Sir Philip Medows; then passes the Bourn river about Tudworth, and so by this place to the eastern gate of Old Sarum, the Roman Sorbiodunum.Sorbiodunum, where it runs most precisely north-east and south-west, as we said before. TAB. LXV.This city is perfectly round, and formed upon one of the most elegant designs one can imagine: probably a fortress of the old Britons, and I fancy somewhat like the famous Alesia in Gaul, memorable for the ancient Hercules, its founder, and for the siege of the great Cæsar; which only his genius could have taken in his circumstances. The prospect of this place is at present very august, and would have afforded us a most noble sight when in perfection: such a one will not be difficult to conceive when we have described it. It fills up the summit of a high and steep hill, which originally rose equally on all sides to an apex: the whole work is 1600 foot diameter, included in a ditch of a prodigious depth: it is so contrived that in effect it has two ramparts, the inner and outer, the ditch between: upon the inner, which is much the higher, stood a strong wall of twelve foot thick, their usual standard, which afforded a parapet at top for the defendants, with battlements quite round: upon still higher ground is another deep circular ditch, of 500 foot diameter; this is the castle or citadel. Upon the inner rampire of this was likewise another wall, I suppose of like thickness: so that between the inner ditch and the outer wall, all around, was the city. This is divided into equal parts by a meridian line: both the banks are still left; one to the south, the other to the north; and these had walls upon them too: the traces of all the walls are still manifest, and some parts of them left; but we may say with the poet of the whole,
In the middle of each half, toward the east and west, is a gate, with each a lunette before it, deeply ditched, and two oblique entries; that to the east is square, to the west round: the hollow where the wall stood is visible quite round, though the materials are well-nigh carried away to New Sarum: in every quarter were two towers, the foundations plainly appearing: then, with those that were upon the cardinal points, the gates and the median rampart, as it must necessarily be understood, there were twelve in the whole circumference; so that, supposing it about 5000 feet in circumference, there was a tower at every 400. Hence we may imagine the nature of the city was thus: a circular street went round in the middle between the inner and outer fortifications, concentric to the whole work; and that cross streets, like radii, fronted each tower: then there were twenty-four islets of building for houses, temples, or the like. Now such is the design of this place, that if one half was taken by an enemy, the other would still be defensible; and at last they might retire into the castle. The city is now ploughed over, and not one house left. In the angle to the north-west stood the cathedral and episcopal palace: the foundations are at present so conspicuous, that I could easily mark out the ground-plot of it, as in the 65th plate: near it is a large piece of the wall left, made of hewn stone with holes quite through at equal spaces. One would imagine the Romans, in laying down the area of this city, had Plato’s rules in view,[136] in his fifth dialogue of laws. Many wells have been filled up, and, no doubt, with noble reliques of antiquity: they must have been very deep, and especially that in the castle, and dug out of the solid chalk. Of the castle-wall a good deal of huge fragments and foundations are left: a double winding stair-case led up to the gate, where bits of arch-work and immense strength of stone and mortar remains; and within, many foundations and traces of buildings. In the north-east corner of the city there is another rampart upon a radius, including a squarish piece of ground; probably for some public edifice, but what in particular, is now hard to say. TAB. LXVI.Certainly, for strength, air, and prospect over the lovely downs, and for salubrity, this place was well calculated, and impregnable to any thing but death and hunger. The river Avon runs near the bottom of the hill. The history of its glory, its strange vicissitudes, and its ruin by removal of the church to New Sarum, may be learnt from Camden, Burton, and other authors; my business being chiefly to describe things: but the very sight of such a carcass would naturally from a traveller extort such an expostulation: Is this the ancient episcopal see, and the seat of warlike men, now become corn-fields, and pasture for sheep? Is this the place where synods have been held, and British parliaments; where all the states of the kingdom were summoned to swear fealty to William the Conqueror; the palace of the most potent British and Saxon kings, and Roman emperors? and conclude with Rutilius,
Before the eastern gate of Sorbiodunum, a branch of the Roman way.Roman way proceeds eastward to Winchester, which has never yet been observed: upon this goes part of the XVth imperial journey in these words; Venta Belgarum, Brige, Sorbiodunum. This way passes the river Bourn at Ford: the ridge of it is plain, though the countrymen have attacked it vigorously on both sides with their ploughs: we caught them at the sacrilegious work, and reprehended them for it: then it goes between Clarendon park, and the camp of Chlorus before described: on the whole length of Farley common it is very conspicuous, made of hard matter dug up all along on both sides; then ascends the hills at Winterslow, which signifies the white hill; then through Buckholt forest, where with good heed the course of it may be followed, though through by-ways, pastures, woods and hedges; sometimes running the length, sometimes crossing it: a little northward of West Titherley it goes close by a farm-house and large barn upon a rising ground, and at the edge of a wood. This is the proper distance of eight miles from Sorbiodunum, and was the ancient Brige.Brige; and Roman antiquities are often found here: the British name imports a town upon the top of the hill; brege, cacumen.
All this country being part of the Conqueror’s new forest, this colony of the Romans shared in that great depopulation he made for his diversion. It is near the brink of that woody hill, called Horseshoe wood from its being upon a hill, overlooking Broughton upon the river Wallop, where Mr. Camden places the Brige. A little way farther upon the same brink, on an apex of the hill, stands a large Celtic barrow, ditched about, called Bols turret:[137] there are several other barrows thereabouts, and probably some Roman; for the Roman road, here called the Cause-way, proceeds upon this edge to the river at Bossington, though sometimes intercepted by corn-fields, where the common road goes about, and then falls into it again: it passes over the river at Bossington, then marches directly to Winchester west gate.
Having described this road, let us return to Sorbiodunum, in order to pursue the Icening-street: but first give me leave to impart to the reader somewhat of the pleasure you and I reaped at the neighbouring Wilton.Wilton. I shall only at this time give a catalogue of my lord Pembroke’s most noble collection of ancient marbles, which may be of use to the curious, in knowing the particulars of that glorious Musœum, or that have a mind to view them.
The BUSTO’S are in number 133. The STATUES 36. The BASSO RELIEVO’S 15. MISCELLANIES 9.
I. Of the BUSTO’S. 1. Those made with eyes of different matter from the bust. A Sibyl, the whole cavity of the eyes hollowed: Ariadne, with agate eyes: A Greek Cupid, with agate eyes: Drusus, Germanicus; these two are in copper, finely performed, with silver eyes.—2. Learned persons. Hesiod: Homer, brought from Constantinople, seems by its high antiquity to have been the first model of the father of the poets: Sappho, the inimitable in poetry; this is of the ivory marble, the last perfection of Greek sculpture: Pythagoras: Anacharsis, of an admirable character: Socrates, by the roguish carver dressed like a Satyr, with sharp ears: Plato, very ancient, and of a most venerable aspect: Aristotle: Aristophanes: Apollonius Tyanæus, a most valuable antiquity, with the right hand and arm: Marcus Modius, an Athenian physician, of excellent Greek work: Epicurus, a little bust of the great atomic philosopher:TAB. XLIV. 2d Vol. Posidonius, preceptor to Cicero: Sophocles: Aspasia, who taught Socrates rhetoric: Isocrates: Cato major: Cicero, of touch-stone: Horace, as some think; a young busto of speckled porphyry; I am inclined to believe it Ovid: Seneca: Persius the Satyrist: Titus Livius.—3. Of coloss proportion. Arsinoe mater: Ahenobarbus, the bad father of the worse Nero: Julia Domna, wife of Severus: Geta when young, their son.—4. Persons of Greece before the Roman empire: Cecrops and his wife represented as Janus: Tmolus, a most ancient founder of a colony: Ganymede, with the Phrygian bonnet, very beautiful: Dido: Arsinoe filia: Phædra, wife of Theseus: Damas, the learned daughter of Pythagoras: Olympias, mother of Alexander: Alexander magnus: Lysimachus: Berenice mater: Berenice filia: Ptolemy, brother to Cleopatra: Cleopatra, wife to Antipater: Ammonius Alexandrinus, one of the Olympic victors: Iotape, wife of Antiochus Comagenes king of Syria.—5. Consular persons: Lucius Junius Brutus, who slew Tarquin: M. Junius Brutus, who slew Cæsar: P. Cornelius Scipio Africanus: Scipio Asiaticus: P. Cornelius Scipio Nasica: one of the brothers of the Horatii: Marcellus: Marius: Sulpicius Rufus: Dolabella: Cneius Pompeius magnus: Sextus Pompeius.—6. Emperors, Empresses, Cæsars and Augustæ, beside Geta and Julia Domna already mentioned. Julius Cæsar, of oriental alabaster, the only original: Augustus: Julia, daughter to Augustus, incomparably fine: Cajus Cæsar: Lucius Cæsar: Marcellus: Drusus senior: Germanicus: Agrippina senior: Antonia, of curious marble: Tiberius, of small brass: Caligula: Cæsonia, wife of Caligula: Claudius, the conqueror of Britain: Drusilla: Messalina: Nero: Sabina Poppæa, his wife, a naked busto: Octavia, his wife: Marcia: Galba: Otho: Vitellius: Lucius Vitellius, brother to the emperor: Vespasian: Titus: Julia, daughter of Titus: Domitian: Vespasianus novus, the adopted son of Domitian: Nerva: Trajan: Hadrian: Sabina: Antinous, Hadrian’s favourite: Antoninus Pius: Faustina senior: M. Aurelius Antoninus Philosophus: Annius Verus: Lucius Verus: Commodus: Lucilla, wife of Ælius: Lucilla junior, wife of Verus: Pertinax: Didius Julianus: Crispina, wife of Commodus: Septimius Severus: Plautilla, wife of Caracalla: Julia Paula: Macrinus: Annia Faustina, wife of Heliogabalus: Julia Mammæa, wife of Verus: Julia Moesa: Lucilla junior: Alexander Severus: Gordianus Cæsar: Balbinus: Sabina Tranquillina, wife of Antonius Gordianus, emperor: Marcia Otacilla; Q. Herennius, a boy: Hostilianus: Volusianus: Valerianus, a boy: Constantinus magnus the Briton, of better work than was commonly in that age, as a few of his medals were.—7. Divinities. Jupiter: Pallas: Apollo, a fine large bust: Diana: Venus, like that of Medicis: Bacchus: Faunus: Fauna: Libera: Libertas: Mercury Pantheon, made of different faces.
II. STATUES. A queen of the Amazons defending herself from a horseman in battle: Cupid, a man, breaking his bow: Clio, the muse, sitting: a Faunus: these are of most admirable workmanship. Five statues reckoned as ancient as any in the several parts of the world. Egypt, Isis with her husband Osiris in Theban iron stone. Thrace, Jupiter Ammon from the temple built by Sesostris, with a ram on his shoulders; it is a very venerable piece. Asia Minor, Diana of Ephesus; the head, hands and feet black, the rest of white marble. Phrygia, Cupid tied to a tree; a Phrygian cap on his head. Lydia, Hercules wrestling with Achelous. Paris with the Phrygian bonnet and shepherd’s coat of skins. Saturn with an infant in his arms. The Egyptian Bacchus, of a fine shape, carrying the young fat Greek Bacchus on his shoulder. A shepherd playing on the flute. A Greek Bacchus. Flora. Silenus drunk, with a club in his hand, fancying himself Hercules, supported by a younger; a piece of most incomparable art. A boy dancing and playing on music. Cupid holding the golden apple. A young Bacchus smiling. Marcus Aurelius on horseback, made at Athens, small. The river Meander, recumbent. A boy in an eager posture, catching at some live thing on the ground. A coloss Hercules, six Attic cubits high, with three apples in one hand. Cleopatra giving suck to Cæsarion her son, sitting. Julia Pia Domna, wife of Septimius Severus, sitting. Livia, the wife of Augustus, sitting. Manlia Scantilla, sitting. Attys the Phrygian, engraved by Montfaucon without the head, which is here restored. Mark Antony, a crocodile at his feet. Apollo. Ceres. Pomona. Andromeda. Young Hercules with the serpents. Hercules, old, with his club. The dwarf of Augustus.
III. BASSO RELIEVO’S. The Story of Niobe, alto relievo, very ancient: there are twenty figures; the marble is 2400 weight; seems to have been a pannel in some temple of Apollo, or Diana. The story of Meleager, being the side of a sarcophagus, seventeen figures, mezzo relievo, 1500 weight, of an admirable taste. Curtius on horseback, leaping into the gaping cavern, of most excellent work. M. Aurelius and Faustina, adversa capita, fine work. Caracalla, a three-quarters relievo. The three Graces. One on horseback, cutting at a soldier defending himself under the horse. The ancient manner of eating, Jupiter served by Hebe: he is accumbent. A frize of a sea-triumph, small figures. Cleopatra with the asps in a covered vase, alto relievo. Part of a frize from a temple of Neptune, Naiades and Tritons. A basso from a temple of Bacchus, the thyrsus, &c. A basso relievo on porphyry of Roemitalces king of Thrace. A child stealing fruit from the altar through a mask.
IV. MISCELLANIES. A nuptial vase, representing the ceremonies of marriage. Ara Hammonis, a cube of white marble, on front the symbol of Jupiter Hammon on a circular piece of the old Theban marble. Two black porphyry pillars brought from Rome by the earl of Arundel. The column of Egyptian granite, weighing near 7000 weight, from the ruins of the temple of Venus genetrix, built by Julius Cæsar: this my lord has set up in the front of the house. A very ancient altar of Bacchus, adorned with basso relievo’s. An altar table of red Egyptian granite, large, and four or five inches thick. An antique pavement, four sorts of marble, of gradual light and shade. The antique picture from the temple of Juno: it is in thick stucco. The sarcophagus of Epaphroditus intire, finely carved with the history of Ceres. The front of Claudia’s sepulchre, sister of Probus the emperor: her head is joined with his. Eighty-five termini of antique marbles, busto’s on seventy-two of them.
From the gate of Sorbiodunum the Icening-street goes from north-east to south-west, by the name of Port lane, over the river Avon at Stretford; then ascends the hill, and passes the united Nadre and Willy near Bemerton, where the stony ford is still very perfect: then it goes across my lord Pembroke’s horse-race course and hare-warren, making a visto to M. Aurelius his equestrian figure in the park. If the spirits and genii of the ancient Romans travel this way, no doubt they will be surprised to find themselves so near the Capitol. Then it traverses the brook at Fenny-Stretford, and so along the great downs toward Cranburn chace: here it delights one to turn and survey its direction towards Sorbiodunum, a sweet prospect; whether we regard what share of it is due to nature, or what to art; and of the latter sort, what is owing to the road, or what to the old city. As it enters the chace there is a most remarkable diverticulum, and which notoriously demonstrates it was begun from the south: for here, as it came from thence across the woods, where its ridge is very perfect, made of stone, it butts full upon the end of a vast valley, very deep and of steep descent; where it was absolutely impracticable to carry the road on in a strait line: the Roman surveyor therefore wisely gave way to nature, turned the road side-ways along the end of the valley, then with an equal angle carried it forward upon the upper side of that valley in full direction to Old Sarum. That great and wise people, though ignorant of submission, knew nature might be drawn aside, but not directly opposed, especially in works that are to be lasting: hence my intent was, to pursue this noble road as far as it would carry me; and the pleasure one perceives in such a concomicant is not to be imagined by any one but those that experience it: to observe their methods in the conduct of such works, their artifices and struggles between industry and the difficulties and diversities of ground, of rivers, &c. and the continual presentment of somewhat worthy of remark by the way, renders it short, and vastly entertaining; nor is the mind ever at a loss for learned amusement. When it has passed through the woods of Cranburn chace, and approaches Woodyates, you see a great dike and vallum (Venndike) upon the edges of the hills to the left by Pentridge, to which I suppose it gave name: this crosses the Roman road, and then passes on the other side, upon the division between the hundred. The large vallum here is southward, and it runs upon the northern brink of the hills; whence I conjecture it a division or fence thrown up by the Belgæ before Cæsar’s time. I call this the second boundary of the Belgæ; two others are already mentioned. I pleased myself with the hopes of observing the Roman road running over it, as doubtless it did originally: but just at that instant both enter a lane, where every thing is disfigured with the wearing away and reparations that have been made ever since. Its high ridge is then inclosed within a pasture just at Woodyates, then becomes the common road for half a mile, but immediately passes forward upon a down, the road going off to the right. I continued the Roman road for two or three mile, where it is rarely visited: it is very beautiful, smooth on both sides, broad at top, the holes remaining whence it was taken, with a ditch on each hand: it is made of gravel, flint, or such stuff as happened in the way, most convenient and lasting. There are vast numbers of Celtic barrows upon these downs, just of such manner and shapes as those of Salisbury plain: at the first and more considerable group I came to, there was a most convincing evidence of the Roman road being made since the barrows: two instances of this nature I gave in the last letter. One form of these barrows, for distinction sake, I call Druids (for what reasons I shall not stand here to dispute:) they are thus. A circle of about 100 foot diameter, more or less, is inclosed with a ditch of a moderate breadth and depth: on the outside of this ditch is a proportionate vallum; in the centre of this inclosure is a small tump, where the remains of the person are buried, sometimes two, sometimes three. Now so it fell out, that the line of direction of the Roman road necessarily carried it over part of one of these tumuli, and some of the materials of the road are dug out of it: this has two little tumps in its centre.
It was now my business to look out for the station in Antoninus called Vindogladia, mentioned in the last journey to be twelve mile from Sorbiodunum. By this time I was come to a proper distance: accordingly I found, at the end of this heath, the road which is all along called Iclingdike, descended a valley where a brook crosses it, from two villages called Gliffet. At All-Saints, or Lower Gliffet, there was a small ale-house, and the only one hereabouts (the Rose:)Vindogladia. my old landlady, after some discourse preparatory, informed me that at Boroston, a mile lower upon the river, had been an old city; and that strangers had come out of their way on purpose to see it; that ruins and foundations were there; that it had seven parish-churches, which were beaten down in the war time; that many old coins had been ploughed up when she was a girl, which the children commonly played withal; but the case at present was plainly the same with that of old Troy, described in the ballad upon her wall, where she showed me these passionate verses,