60 PAPERS, ETC. 



tliemselves, antl still less, that it was not a Belgic or 

 aboriginal British work, afterwarcls occupied by tbe Ro- 

 mans and Romano-British, which we may almost positive- 

 ly assert is the fact. Whether it be Belgic, or originally 

 British, may be more difficult to determine ; and the total 

 obliteration of all works within the ramparts, increases the 

 difficulty very mach ; but, on the whole, from the general 

 plan and construction of the fortifications, being a series of 

 concentric ramparts, without any independent outworks, 

 with the exception of the platforms I have before men- 

 tioned, as well as from the absence of all trace of the 

 thrce-fold arrangement which I have elsewhere spoken of, 

 as analogous to the outer and inner bailies and keep of a 

 medircval Castle, and which I am inclined to believe is the 

 characteristic type of the original British fortified towns in 

 this part of England, I am inclined to believe it to be a 

 very strong military post of the Belgoe, probably intended 

 as a sort of head quarters for their armies in this part of 

 their tcrritories ; and to this opinion I am the more in- 

 clined from the marked difFerence observable between the 

 plan of this fortification, and those to which I have 

 alluded as occupying the strong ground from sea to sea on 

 the West of the Parret, and being probably the line of 

 frontier strongholds established by the aborigines, as a 

 defence against the Belgic invaders. The name, too, of 

 the place, Cath Byrig, which I believe means the military 

 town, or the town of the battle, would seein, in some 

 degree, to strengthen this opinion. 



MILBOURNE WICK 



I now come to the third object to which I wish to draw 

 attention, the very curious earthwork in the neighbour- 

 hood of Milbourne Wick, which I mentioned as appearing 



