XV. on the Antiquity of Abury and Stonehenge, by JOHN RICKMAN, Esq., F.R.S

399 XV. On the Antiquity of Abury and Stonehenge, by JOHN RICKMAN, Esq., F.R.S. Read 13th June, 1839. JL AM sensible that I undertake an unpopular task in endeavouring to restrain within ascertained limits the unknown date of the most revered objects of antiquarian curiosity extant in Great Britain ; but I also know that in the estimation of enlightened minds, truth, or (its near adjunct) probability, is preferable to indefinite wonder; and I shall venture to produce circum- stantial evidence, that the antiquity of Stonehenge and even of Abury, falls short of the commencement of the Christian era. To begin with facts and dates not very problematical, I shall assume that the Roman roads in Kent, which evidently aim at uninterrupted com- munication between the Continent and London, were made or in progress at the time of Agricola (A.D. 60), when London was not indeed dignified with the title or privileges of a military colony of veterans, but is said by Tacitus to be famed for its commercial importance ; and the great number of inhabitants and others at that time slaughtered there by the insurgent Britons, confirms its early pretensions as the then capital city of Britain. The Roman roads in Kent deserve notice as having been planned with an intention of greater scope than (within my knowledge) has been ascribed to them. The nearest and middle harbour of access from Gaul was evidently Dover; but whenever the wind was unfavourable for a direct passage, fur- ther resource became desirable, and from Lemanis (Lymne, near Hythe) and Ritupse (Richborough, near Sandwich) branch roads were made, joining the Dover road at Canterbury; so that a dispatch-boat, by sailing from the windward port, or steering for the leeward of these three ports, could seldom fail of a ready passage to or from the continent; and especially it is remark- able, that the prevailing south-west wind (with this advantage) permitted a direct passage from Gessoriacum or Itius (Boulogne or Witsand) to Ritupae; in effect to London; the Wantsum channel then and long after existing within the Isle of Thanet to Regulbium (Reculver) on the Thames, being VOL. XXVIII. 3 F 400 On the Antiquity of Abury and Stonehenge. that by which early navigation was sheltered in its access to the British metropolis. Indeed the first paragraph of the Itinerary of Antoninus gives the reputed distance from Gessoriacum to Ritupse, as if more important or more in use than the shorter passage to Dover.* Canterbury affords no indication of Roman origin, and was probably the British capital of Kent before Julius Caesar invaded Britain ; nor could any track-way of an uncivilized people find its course from Canterbury to London, otherwise than by the lowest practicable ford across the river Medway at Maidstone. From this place the native Britons travelled onward by way of Noviomagus (Holwood); the first syllable of its name probably being prefixed by the Romans when they began to inhabit this British stronghold and made their tombs below Holwood, on the side of the old track-way ; which must have continued in use for cattle and bulky commodities till many centuries after- wards ; in fact, until Rochester bridge was built. Maidstone (Vagniacse) indeed finds a place in the Itinerary, although (from want of a practicable line between that place and Canterbury) this direct road from London, through Noviomagus, turns abruptly northward (in the Itinerary) from Maidstone to Rochester^ (Durobrivis), where the Romans had established a ferry, protected by a fortified station, and thereby had secured a direct road from Canterbury to London for military purposes and pedestrians. % After the Kentish roads were thus established, other military roads were successively made; the most eminent of which, the Watling Street, must have been among the first, as passing through the British town of Verulamium (near St. Alban's), at that time the largest town next after London. Yet we must conclude, from evidence which cannot be obliterated, that another road from London preceded the Watling Street in formation ; because, at the * " A Gessoriaco de Galliis, Ritupis in portu Britanniarum, Stadia numero CCCCL"j—Pliny says [Lib. mi. c. 16.] 50 miles, which is not far from the fact. t The name of Rochester is perhaps more nearly connected with this its assumed origin than at first sight appears. The Welch descendants of the Provincial Britons call the City of Rome Caer- Muffin; and the appellation of the Bishop of Rochester (Roffen'), known to be as ancient as the establishment of Christianity in Kent, still remains in sound the same; so that Roffen-ceaster (Saxon) being translated, is no other than The Roman Fortress. % The Roman road from London to Durobrivis (Rochester) by way of Noviomagus and Vagniacge, was (according to the 2d iter) 37 miles. The direct road from London to Durobrivis (according to the 3d iter and the 4th iter) was 27 miles. On the Antiquity of Abury and Stonehenge. 401 Tyburn end of Oxford Street, the ancient Watling Street deviates northward by a decided angle from the direct and therefore more ancient road towards Bath; and this priority is supported by probability, founded on the well- known passion for the use of warm baths, which produced edifices at Rome second only in extent to the Flavian Amphitheatre of the eternal city. Indeed a subordinate motive existed for the early formation of a Bath road, inasmuch as it passes through Calleva (Silchester), the third of British towns in extent; London being, within the walls of Constantius, about 370 acres, Verulam within its walls 245 acres, and Calleva rather more than 100 acres; and that the Romanized inhabitants of the last named town were distinguished by their cultivated taste, is testified by the amphitheatre out- side the walls, one of the few undisputed relics of that kind in Britain. The Roman road reaches Calleva by way of Staines (Pontes), and, crossing the river Kennet at Newbury, passes on through Spinse (Speen) to Cunetio (near Marlborough) and Verlucio, to Aquae Solis (Bath). (See Supplementary Note ].) Having premised thus much, I hasten to proceed to the professed object of this essay ; first abjuring the authority of Dr. Stukeley, who bestowed great attention on the Abury Circus, but whose imagination too often sur- passed even his zeal in antiquarian research. Much is due to this amiable man and accomplished scholar notwithstanding his credulity and unaccount- able inaccuracies of representation ; to establish which fact against him it is enough to refer to his verbal description and plan of the well-known Sil- chester, as if its walls included a regular four-sided figure, it being in fact an irregular eight-sided polygon, seemingly regulated in a great degree by some antecedent circular entrenchment of a British place of refuge ; yet, by a date marked under a tolerably good sketch of the adjacent amphitheatre, it is proved that the Doctor really visited the place in May, 1724. His plan of Abury itself does not violate the truth, otherwise than as exhi- biting many more stones than existed in his time. But he misrepresents the road between West Kennet and Silbury, as if crooked instead of rectilinear, and making a turn half round the base of the artificial hill; as if the Roman road aimed at such an obstruction merely for the sake of thus avoiding it; and he then relies on this fictitious curve in support of his opinion of the priority of date of the said hill. 3 F 2 402 On the Antiquity of Abury and Stonehenge. My first suspicion that the great earthen Circus at Abury was planned with reference to the Roman road, and therefore after its formation, sprang from the well-known fact that the Roman mile was about one-twelfth part shorter than an English mile (see Note 2) ; for it may be seen in the Ordnance Map, and on a larger scale in Sir Richard Colt Hoare's ground-plan of the situation of Abury [see Plate XXIII.] that, with a radius of a Roman mile, assuming Silbury Hill as a centre, you strike through the middle of the Abury Circus, and also cut the Roman road, where it is crossed by the Druidic avenue ; which with a graceful curve led from a marked commencement (as if for forming a procession), in a circle of stones (now destroyed) which stood at some little distance south of the Bath road. The above- mentioned adoption of the Roman mile shews that measure of length to have been used for settling the position of Abury Circus and its adjuncts, in like manner as the mensuration of the length and breadth of the passages and interior apartments of the Great Pyramid by Greaves, enabled Sir Isaac Newton to settle the exact length of the Egyptian, or sacred cubit; of which all these measures proved to be aliquot parts or multiples. Nor is it foreign to our subject to mention in this place, for the sake of comparison, that the Great Pyramid covers an area of nearly twelve acres English (16 Egyp- tian) and Silbury Hill four acres and a half, its circumference (omitting, the surrounding grassy slope of matter washed down from the surface of the hill) being 2,300 feet; its altitude or perpendicular height is 130 feet to the flat surface (35 yards diameter) which forms its truncated summit. A considerable work certainly; but in viewing attentively the situation of Silbury Hill, I cannot but doubt whether it be entirely an artificial work; to me it appears to be placed upon the end of a moderate ridge, which ridge interrupting the necessary line of Roman road, was therefore cut through to some depth, and between the road and Silbury Hill the cut has been widened and sunk lower than the road, which operation is proof enough that such road existed before the hill was raised by man's labour; for it is incredible that any road-maker should have been so ignorant and stupid as not to have taken advantage of the depression of surface (if it then existed between the road and the hill) for easing the ascent.

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