I shall therefore make it the subject of the present volume, to describe one or two of each sort of the temples built upon the plan of these figures: wherein the founders have left an incontestible proof of that knowledge which the ancient world had of the divine nature, by these durable and magnificent monuments. The remainder of these temples (as many as are come to my knowledge) together with the places of the sports and games of the ancient _Britons_, and the religion of the Druids, I shall publish in the succeeding volume. Names or words are necessary for the understanding of things; therefore 1. The round temples simply, I call temples; 2. Those with the form of a snake annext, as that of _Abury_, I call serpentine temples, or _Dracontia_, by which they were denominated of old; 3. Those with the form of wings annext, I call alate or winged temples. And these are all the kinds of Druid temples that I know of. We may call these figures, the symbols of the patriarchal religion, as the cross is of the christian. Therefore they built their temples according to those figures. _ROWLDRICH._ I shall begin with _Rowlright_ or rather _Rowldrich_, and as a specimen of what requisites are sought for in these enquiries, I shall draw them up in a kind of order: which may be useful in all researches of this sort. 1. A situation on high ground, open heaths, by heads of rivers. ROWLDRICH is a temple of the Druids of the first kind, a circular work which has been often taken notice of in print, lying in the north-west part of _Oxfordshire_: upon high ground, where the counties of _Oxford_, _Warwick_, and _Glocester_ meet. ’Tis near the town of _Chippin-Norton_. Two rivers rise here, that run with quite contrary directions; the _Evenlode_ towards the south part of the kingdom, which joining the _Isis_ below _Woodstock_, visits the great luminary of _Britain_, _Oxford_, and then meets the _Thames_ at _Dorchester_, the ancient _Episcopal see_ of the _Mercian_ kingdom. At this _Dorchester_ are fine remains both of _Saxon_ church antiquity, of _Roman_, and of _British_. The inquisitive that prefer our own country antiquities to the vain tour of foreign, will find much of curious amusement there. The other river _Stour_ runs from _Rowldrich_ directly north, to meet the _Avon_ at _Stratford_, thence to the _Severn_ sea. So that _Rowldrich_ must needs stand on very high ground, and to those that attentively consider the place itself, it appears to be a large cop’d hill, on the summit of an open down; and the temple together with the Archdruid’s barrow hard by, stand on the very tip of it, having a descent every way thence: and an extensive prospect, especially into _Glocestershire_ and _Warwickshire_. The country hereabouts was originally an open, barren heath; and underneath, a quarry of a kind of rag stone. At present near here are some inclosures, which have been plough’d up.