ANTIQUITIES OF NORTHUMBERLAND. 71 



We continue our courfe up the hill by St. OfivaMs- chapel to 

 the igth mile-flone, a little beyond which we are prefented with 

 a fine view of 



Hexham, fituated chiefly on an eminence, by the little brook 

 Hextold, and near the united ftreams of South and North Tyne, 

 giving its name to a large trad of country, called, IL-xhamfhire. 

 It is a town of great antiquity. The moft learned antiquaries be- 

 lieve it to be Roman, and all, except Mr. HorJIey, give it the name- 

 of Axelodunum, or Uxelodunum, importing the fame thing as the 

 Celtic or antient Britifn word Uchelodunum, i. e. a high fituation. 

 Mr. Horjley will have it to be the Roman Epiacum or Ebchejtn- of 

 Camden (t), and that Brough on the So/wfiy-fands in. Cumberland, was 

 their Axelodunum, and the flation of their Cohorsprima Uifpanonun (u). 



In the year 1726, Roger Gale, Efq; and Dr. Stukeley, antiquaries 

 of great name, were in this country in fearch of antiquities, and 

 at Hexham. In a vault at Hexham-clmrch, the burial-place of the- 

 late Rev. Mr. Andrews, A. M. they difcovered two infcriptions, 

 both Roman, and both, in their opinion, curious. Mr. Gale, in 

 Ms letter to Baron Clerk, infertcd in Mr. Gordons Appendix, ob- 

 ferves, that the firft is of very ill work, but what makes it curious 

 is, it contains a new name of a Legatus Augujli, viz. ^.. Calpurnius 

 Concejfinius, and that of a body of horfe at Cor-chejter, called Equite* 

 Gefarienfes, or Ctefariani Coronotatz, not mentioned either in the No- 

 titia Imperii, or any where elfe. The other is of Lucius Septimius 

 Severus, of the beft fculpture, the letters large* but very imper- 

 fect. The curiofity of it confifts in its having fo diftinctly the 

 name of that emperor, and its being the only genuine one found 



(t) Camden s Britannia, p. 955. 



(u) Hon. Britannia Romans, p. 109, 



