194 Leland’s Journey through Wiltshire. 
therof being stony. This maner place hath 2 courtes. The fronte 
of the inner courte is magnificent, and high embatelid, castle 
lyke. 
[The goodly gate howse and fronte of the Lorde Stowrton’s howse 
in Stourton was buyldyd ex spoliis Gallorum: (with French prize 
money). vr. 100.]! 
Ther is a parke among hills joining on the maner place. 
The ryver of Stowre risith ther, of 6 fountaines or springes, 
wherof 3 be on the north side of the parke hard within the pale. 
A.D, 1650, was discovered in Aubrey’s MSS. at Oxford. Sir R. C. Hoare has since 
given this in the appendix to History of Frustfield [p. 7.] We now present for the 
first time a more developed view of it, founded upon Aubrey’s rough sketch. 
Old Stourton House stood upon a site immediately in front of the present 
mansion of Stourhead, between that house and the public road leading to 
Maiden Bradley. The site is still to be recognized by an inequality of ground, 
a few old Spanish chestnut trees, and some subterranean vaults. A relic of the 
building is, or lately was, preserved in a house at Shaftesbury formerly the 
‘* King’s Arms ;” a carved chimney piece, bearing the shield of Stourton 
between those of Chidiock and Berkeley. [See a plate, in Gent. Mag. 1826, 
p- 497.] The house covered a great deal of ground, and retained all the 
internal arrangement of old baronial days. There was a large open-roofed 
hall, and an open-roofed kitchen of extraordinary size. In the buttery was 
kept a huge bone, attributed by tradition to one of the Anakim of the house of 
Stourton, but which was no doubt a geological relic of some different species of 
animal of much greater antiquity. There was a chapel, paved with tiles 
bearing the Stourton shield, and the rebus, ‘‘ W.S.,” a tower and a tun. In 
the civil wars the house was garrisoned for the King. In Sept. 1644 Ludlow 
marched thither one night, and summoned it to surrender. His summons not 
being attended to, his men piled faggots against one of the gates and set it on 
fire. The inmates escaped by a back way into the park; upon which the 
General entered, and having rendered it untenable passed on to Witham. The 
Stourton family was of great eminence and antiquity in Wiltshire. It is said 
that at a house of their’s here, William the Conqueror received the submission 
of the English in the West. When the estate was purchased by Henry Hoare, 
Esq., of London, in 1720 [or 1727, for Sir R. C. H. has both dates, Mere, 
p. 56 and 63], the house of which we give the view was taken down. 
1 The builder of this part was Sir John Stourton who, for his services to the 
Henries in their French wars, was created the First Baron in a.p, 1448. He 
had the Duke of Orleans in his custody at Stourton House for 10 months, for 
which he was allowed 13s, 4d, a day, 
