Itinerarium curiosum (centuria I) : $b or, an account of the antiquities, and remarkable curiosities in nature or art, observed in travels through Great BritainStukeley, William
History
Itinerarium curiosum (centuria I) : $b or, an account of the antiquities, and remarkable curiosities in nature or art, observed in travels through Great Britain
Stukeley, William
Great Britain -- Antiquities -- Early works to 1800; Great Britain -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800
From hence riding along the hare-warren and end of the park, we are
entertained with the landscape of no less than five rivers, four
retaining the old British names: the villages on each side of them are
so thick, that they seem to join and form long cities in woods. About
the union of these rivers are three cities and three cathedrals within
a triangle, whose sides are less than three miles; Wilton, Old and New
Sarum. The _Nadre_ signifies a snake or adder, metaphorically drawn
from its winding current: it rises by the end of the Ten-mile course
above described, and passes by a pleasant village belonging to your
lordship, Chilmark, famous for its quarries; of a very good stone,
white, and that rises in any dimensions: there is now a single stone,
lying over the mouth of the quarry like an architrave, full sixty foot
long, twelve foot thick, and, as the workmen have assured me upon
examination, perfectly without flaw: sometimes here are found great
petrified oyster-shells. The Willy rises about Warminster, taking in a
little brook, the Dyver, passing under ground, runs by Yarnbury, a vast
Roman camp, where some think is Vespasian’s name; a great semi-circular
work at the entrance: several Roman coins have been found here. Not
far off is a ditch called Chiltern, which seems to be some division of
the hundreds. There is another camp on the other side the Willy: then
it runs by Grovely, a great wood of your lordship’s: it admits another
stream coming on the west side of Stonehenge from Orcheston, remarkable
for a long kind of grass, which without good proof I should scruple
relating, for it is commonly twenty-five foot in length, much coveted
by cattle; by Mr. Ray called _gramen caninum supinum longissimum_:
he says they use to fatten hogs with it. This Willy, that gives name
to Wilton, passes chiefly on the north side of the town, makes the
canal before the front of the house, and then joins the Nadre, coming
on the south side of the town and through the gardens, at the end of
the avenue. The Avon arises from under the great ridge of hills that
divides Wiltshire into north and south, crowned with the Wansditch: it
passes southward through innumerable villages to Ambsbury, the _pagus
Ambri_ famous for a monastery built by one Ambrus, which the monks and
fabulous writers have wrested into _Ambrosbury_; then for a celebrated
nunnery of noble-women, great numbers of whom, against the institution
of Nature and Providence, were here veiled: it is now the seat of my
lord Charlton, built by Inigo Jones, and deservedly to be admired: some
new works are added to it under the direction of my lord Burlington,
possessor of his spirit, and a noble collection of his designs. The
famous old city of _Sorbiodunum_ may be said to stand upon this river:
it meets with the other two just before it passes through Salisbury,
and beyond it receives the Bourn, which has dropped its proper name:
but I guess it to have been _Colin_ or _Colinity_, the same as _Clun_;
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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