Early British trackways, moats, mounds, camps, and sitesWatkins, Alfred
History
Early British trackways, moats, mounds, camps, and sites
Watkins, Alfred
Great Britain -- Antiquities; Leys -- Great Britain; Megalithic monuments -- Great Britain; Mounds -- Great Britain
At the present time it is impracticable to sight from point to point
(especially on water points) on account of intervening trees. It is
certain that for many centuries the sighting points were used, and
that trees did not then intervene. This throws a doubt on the usual
glib statement that ancient Britain was one dense forest. Perhaps the
increase of trees was a cause of the decay of the system.
CAMPS.
I find that every camp seems to have several leys over it, and that
these usually come over the earthworks, not the camp centre, as with
moats. Also that camps almost always show signs of part of their
earthworks being tumps. At Sutton Walls are four unmistakable tumps,
in one of which an interment was found, and in another (Plate XIV.)
the Club at its visit saw the bases of two masonry columns of Roman
construction, the use of which seemed a mystery. I feel certain they
were columns built by Roman surveyors for exact sighting.
Standing on the highest part of Dinedor Camp earthworks, the towers of
Hereford Cathedral and All Saints’ Church can be seen exactly in a line
to the stand point.
The camp plans in past Transactions show signs of tumps in most camps.
It is impossible to assume that leys (sighted between two mountains)
should in the scores of instances exactly fall upon the earthworks of
camps previously built on sites selected solely for defence. The leys
came first, and the present camp was then merely the site of two or
more tumps. There came a period of organised raids and war, and where
a group of tumps gave the first elements of defensive works, they were
joined by earthworks into a complete enclosure for defence. Here again
sighting settled the sites of camps. Hereford Castle Green with Hogg’s
Mount the only remaining sighting tump, others (as at the Russian
gun) being now levelled, is an example. Many groups of tumps, never
developed into camps but sufficiently near to be so, are to be found on
the map.
I found Caplar Camp to have so many leys over it as to seem the Clapham
Junction of ancient trackways in that district. It may be that in a few
cases of lofty camps (as Croft Ambury and Herefordshire Beacon) they
form terminals of sighting lines, but in almost all cases the leys pass
over them.
CHURCHES.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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