330 Ahury. 



stones were visible between this point and the entrance of the avenue 

 upon the open cultivated fields. " "When it has cross'd the way lead- 

 in o- from South street, we discern here and there the remains of it, in 

 its road to Longstone Cove. Farmer Griffin broke near 20 of the 

 stones of this part of the avenue." The two large stones near the Long 

 barrow stand "on the midway of the length of the avenue," and are 

 " placed upon an eminence, the highest ground which the avenue 

 passes over." One of these stones set upon the arc of a circle at 

 an obtuse angle with two others, which have disappeared, formed a 

 cove resembling that in the centre of the northern temple at Abury, 

 of which Aubrey has preserved a sketch. The stone now standing 

 is 16 feet high, as many broad, and 3 J thick, and formed the eastern 

 jamb of the cove. The back stone, of like dimension, which was 

 lying on the ground when Stukeley wrote, has been removed many 

 years; while the third was carried away by Richard Fowler when 

 Stukeley was at Abury. Aubrey, in his ' Monumenta Britannica,' 

 thus speaks of the stones he saw at this spot; "Southward from 

 Aubur}'- in the ploughed field, doe stand three huge upright stones, 

 perpendicularly, like the three stones at Anbury; they are called 

 the Devill's Coytes." (See plate viii. 2.^) Dr. Musgrave speaks 

 of them as 'Diaboli Disci,' and says that Dr. Gale considered them 

 to have been Belgic Hermse.- Of the stones which formed the part 

 of the avenue between Abury and this cove, Stukeley says, "Many 

 stones by the way are just buried under the surface of the earth. 

 Many lie in the balks and meres, and many fragments are remov'd 

 to make boundaries for the fields ; but more whole ones have been 

 burnt to build withal, within every body's memory. One stone stiU 



' Aubrey's sketch gives the position, not the form of these stones. For a re- 

 presentation of the remaining one, see Hoare's 'Ancient Wilts,' ii. pi. xv. f. 2. 



2 "De lapidibus altis immensas magnitudinis quos Diaboli Discos appellat vul- 

 gus, plurimEe sunt conjectux'ffi, quarum unani alibi tangam." Musgrave's 'Bel- 

 gium Britannicum,' vol. i. p. 44, 1 719. " Sed ut banc rem extra dubiiim pouam 

 doctissimus Galajus, in explicandis vetcrum monumentis cum primis sagax, Agro 

 Cunetioni vicino (est illud oppidulum Belgii) trcs lapides pyramidales esse tradit, 

 quosHermas esse non sine ratione judieat, iisquc non absimiles, quos propelsurium 

 (Aldborough) inventos sere inscidpi fecit. Tres eraut hujusmodi lapides ia 

 hoc agro, ut in Isuriano, et forte ad euudem usum nempe viam commonstrandam, 

 undo Mercui'ius dicebatur ei/oStoy." Ibid, p. 111. 



