100 The Mizmaze on Breamore Down, near Downton. 
Churches, chiefly from the twelfth century and onwards. Of those 
recorded by Mr. Trollope I will mention one incised upon a porch 
pier at Lucca Cathedral, 20in. in diameter; a square one formerly 
existing in the pavement of the Abbey Church of St. Bertin at 
Saint Omer; an octagonal one 34ft. in diameter in the entrance to 
the Parish Church (twelfth century) of St. Quentin; and a circular 
one in the nave floor of Chartres Cathedral, of grey and white 
marble, 30ft. in diameter, its path being 668ft. in length, and with its 
outer and inner circles richly ornamented with escallops and cusping.} 
In England no such architectural examples are known,? but 
similar designs are to be seen in the labyrinths cut in the turf at 
many places, and variously named “ Troy Town,” Julian’s Bower,”’ 
“ Mizmaze,” etc. ‘Though some of these may have had their origin 
in popular games, yet many bear a remarkable family likeness to 
the Italian and French pavements; and the circular mizmaze on 
Breamore Down is in fact an exact reproduction of the design at 
Lucca, at Chartres, and (except that it is circular instead of 
octagonal) at St. Quentin. A maze at Alkborough, Lincolnshire, 
is also identical in plan, but about half the size of that at Breamore. 
The only evidence of the existence of a labyrinth in Wilts, of which 
I am aware, is “The Mizmaze Wood” at West Ashton. There is, 
however, no trace of a labyrinth there now, and the only ex- 
planation that the oldest inhabitant can give of the name is that 
the field is a rough one, and “all of a mizmaze.” ® 
This striking resemblance, together with the fact of the proximity 
of most of these turf-labyrinths to a Church or religious house, 
seems to indicate the ecclesiastical origin of at least the greater 
1 The Italian labyrinths are described by M. Durand in Didron’s Annales 
Archéol., vol. xvii., p.119; and the French labyrinths by Wallett, “ Description 
d’ un Pavé mosaique a St. Omer,” Douai, 1843, p. 97. 
2 In the modern pavement of the west bay of the nave of Ely Cathedral, there 
is a labyrinth 20ft. square, perhaps copied from a foreign example. 
3 The name is now generally applied to a field, but in an old survey “ Mizmaze 
Wood” is described as part of a larger wood called ‘‘ Lion Ball Wood,” and the 
two are mentioned together in the tithe map of 1840. Canon Jackson suggests 
that it was a maze in the grounds of a house belonging to the Beach family 
formerly standing here. Wilts Arch. Mayg., vol. xiii., p. 331; Aubrey’s Coll., 
p. 354. 
