8 Stonehenge and its Barrows. 



vel quare ibi constructi sunt." ^ " The second is at Stanenges 

 (Stonehenge), where stones of a wonderful size have been erected 

 after the manner of doorways, so that doorway appears to have been 

 raised upon doorway, nor can any one conceive by what art such 

 great stones have been so raised aloft, or why they were there con- 

 structed." At a later period, when the Archdeacon of Huntingdon 

 was on his way to Rome with Theobald, the newly-consecrated 

 Archbishop of Canterbury, he met with the work of Geoffrey of 

 Monmouth at the Abbey of Bee in Normandy, and abridged it. 

 He appears to have adopted Geoff'rey's story about Stonehenge, as in 

 a letter to Wariuus Brito he says, " Uterpendragon, id est Caput 

 Di'aconis, juvenis prsestantissimus filius [sic'\ scilicet Aurelii Ambrosii, 

 choream gigantum attulit ab HiberniS,, qxiss nunc vocatur Stan- 

 henges." * 



Before the year 1139, the work of the great British-Mythologist, 

 Geoffrey of Monmouth, had been given to the world. His " Historia 

 Britonum is the fountain-head of legendary British history, and 

 poetry, and the source of— 



' what resonnds 

 In fable or romance of Uther's son, 

 Begirt with British and Armorio Knights,' 



as well as the original to which we are indebted for the writings of 

 Wace, Layamon, Robert of Gloucester (the rhyming historian), 

 Robert of Brunne, and many more, — ^not to mention its influence on 

 the historical literature of England up to the seventeenth century/" 



•The other three things, " qnse mira videntur in Anglia," are " primum 

 qnidem est quod ventus egreditur de cavernis terrse in monte qui vooatur Peo, 

 tanto vigore ut vestes injectas repellat, et in altum elevatas procul ejiciat. 

 Tertium est apud Chederhole ; ubi cavitas est sub terra quam cum multi ssepe 

 ingressi sint, et ibi magna spatia terrse et flumina pertransierint, nunquam 

 tomen ad finem evenire potuerunt. Quartum est, quod in quibusdam partibus 

 pluvia videtur elevari de montibus, et sine mora per campos difiundi." 



* Ep. H. Hunt ; ad calcem Guiberti Novigent. ed. Dacherii p. 739, cited by 

 Herbert, C.C, p. 161. 



'Sir Frederick Madden, on "The Historia Britonum of Geofirey of Mon- 

 mouth." Aich. Journ., vol. xv., p. 299. Geoffrey died in 1154, having been 

 made Bishop of St. Asaph, 1152. 



