By the Rev. Canon J. E. Jackson. 109 
This is a specimen of the original Record. 
“SWANBURGH. Turnus Vic’ tent’ ibm die Merc’ prox’ post 
Festm Stor’ Tiburcii & Valeriani Anno R. 
Henr’ Sexti post congm xvij° 
Stone,” its claim to having been King Alfred’s rendezvous fairly deserves to be 
considered. Now it does so happen that a few miles N. W. of Warminster 
there is still to be seen an Ancient Stone, called ‘‘ Redbridge Stone,” marked 
on Andrews and Dury’s County Map of Wilts, 1773. It is not very large: 
“projecting at least above ground only two or three feet. It stands on the Fair- 
wood estate, in a small plantation on the left hand of, and touching the Railway 
cutting, about one mile from Westbury Station going towards Frome. The 
mouth of the people, which has turned ‘‘ Freeman’s” into ‘‘ Vermin’s,” “ St. 
Edith’s”’ into ‘‘ Tiddy’s,” ‘‘ St Oswald’s ” into ‘‘ Snozzle’s,” and “‘ Bello Sguardo” 
into ‘‘ Beller’s Garden” may, easily enough, have degraded ‘* Ecgbryght’s”’ into 
‘‘Redbridge.” 
I do not wish to be understood as contending that this is or must be the real 
Petra Ecbrighti. Not that there is likely to be any old Ochiltree to call out 
from behind a hedge, ‘‘ Pretorian here, Pretorian there, I mind the bigging 
o’t””—for it has all the appearance of great antiquity ; but still, it may have 
some perfectly different history. The existence of sucha stone, bearing such 
a name, standing towards the East of Selwood, well known to the peasantry and 
marked in a County map, struck me as a cuvious circumstance, and for that 
reason I mention it. Being close to the border of two counties it would have 
been a not unsuitable place for muster, and a ride of thirty miles through Sel- 
wood would have brought the King and his Staff to it from Athelney. 
Supposing then only for a moment that this was King Alfred’s first halting 
place, where was the next, the much disputed Aicglea? It is difficult to believe 
that it could have been either at Cley Hill, or Bucley, or Leigh (near Westbury) 
or I/ey mead near Melksham, all, places that have had their advocates. The 
- distances are far too insignificant : and the same may be said of Iley Oak (near 
Warminster) above mentioned. The secret of Alfred’s success [like that of 
Joshua against the Amorites] lay in the rapidity of a forced march. ‘* Having 
with him all his men of war and all the mighty men of valour, Joshua came 
unto them suddenly, and went up from Gilgal all night.” K. Alfred did not 
indeed go up “all night’ but he ‘‘ went up” from break of dawn, all day: till 
he reached Aicglea. In order to reach any one of the places above named he 
needed not to start quite so early nor travel so long. It must surely have been 
at an unusual distance. Dr. Beke, Professor of Modern History at Oxford many 
years ago, suggested that the King struck straight across Wiltshire till he 
reached the opposite boundary, where the Hundred of Acglei in Berks begins. This 
was an Old Hundred, but is now merged in another, the two forming Kintbury 
Eagle. The precise spot called Acglei from which the Old ‘‘ Hundred” took 
its name may now be unknown; but some particular spot so called there must 
have been ; precisely as in the case of several existing Wiltshire Hundreds 
_ mentioned above in the Text. Perhaps some Berkshire archeologist may some 
day be able to discover it under the disguise of Eggle, Aggle, Edgelease, Engle, 
