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By Rev. H. S. SOLLY, M.A. 



(Read on the Hill July 19th, 1899.) 



JTIHIS camp on Eggardon Hill, about which I have been 

 asked to say a few words, belongs to the class 

 which used to be called Roman camps, but which 

 we now know were not constructed by the Romans, 

 but by the inhabitants whom the Romans found 

 here and conquered. Such fortifications are 

 generally called British camps, and there is no 

 objection to this name if we understand that it 

 does not imply a Celtic origin. For the inhabitants 

 of this part of Britain conquered by the Romans were not a 

 Celtic race did not belong to the great Aryan Family of nations 

 but were Iberians, and are now represented by the Basques of 

 the Pyrenees. They were a small, delicate-featured race, with 

 dark hair and eyes, and have left considerable evidence of them- 

 selves as ancestors among the Dorset population of to-day. We 

 find their camps extending over a considerable area of Britain, 

 as far east as Lewes in Sussex and along the Welsh Marches. 

 There are many fine specimens on the downs of Dorset, Maiden 



