Siip2)osed British Remains. 7 



speaks of it as an old British camp. Inside the vallum the ground 

 is broken up into a great number of cavities, which some have 

 imagined to indicate a mode of shelter resorted to by some of the 

 ancient inhabitants of this spot. Sir R. C. Hoare, however, received 

 information from some quarter, that a peculiar white stone used in 

 the lining of chimneys was once dug here, and that these cavities 

 were a succession of small quarries. Generally the chalk is far too 

 soft in this spot to admit of its being used for any such purpose. 



To the north of Rybury, rising to a greater altitude, is the 

 conspicuous eminence, the loftiest of this range called commonly 

 St. Anne's Hill, or by a natural corruption, Tan Hill. * Here an. 

 annual fair is held, chiefly for the sale of sheep and horses on 

 August 6th, (26th July old style) the festival of St. Anne, mother 

 to the Blessed Virgin. Many have been the theories respecting 

 the first origin of this fair, and the real meaning of the name 

 given to the hill. The late Mr. Bowles would fain tax our cre- 

 dulity, by assuming that the original name was Tan Hill, and St. 

 Anne's hill a perversion of it, and that in this fair we must recog- 

 nize the ancient holiday of some Celtic Jupiter whom he calls 

 Tanaris, to whom he believed the hill had once been sacred. And 

 the late Mr. Duke would fain lead us on a similar track, when he 

 says "The fair of St. Anne, the successor nearly in name and 

 nature (as I suppose) to the ferias of the goddess Diana, is well 

 known by fame throughout the county of Wilts, whose rural 

 population recognize as Tan Hill fair, that which is evidently the 

 fair of St. Anne's Hill." ^ 



It will not be deemed presumptuous, it is hoped, if we venture 



to pass over with a smile these lucubrations of very worthy men. 



We are in a position, it is believed, to give a far less romantic 



mentioned bv Mr. Aubrey in his MSS. under the title of Rybury Camp." Hoare's 

 Ancient Wilts, Vol. ii., p. 12. 



1 In like manner Tooley Street, Southwark, is so called from the church of 

 St. Olave, -which is situated in it ; thus, St. Olaf contracted gradually into 

 ^Tolaf and Tooley. The like change has taken place in a name at Bradford on 

 Avon. A small chapel, dedicated to St. Olave, stood in what is now called 

 "Woolley Street : originally however it was called Tooley Street, and is described 

 in Latin deeds as " vicus Saneti Olavi." 



^ Duke's Druidical Temples, p. 95. 



