ANCIENT DEFENSIVE EARTHWORKS 



ating the ancient Watling Street, which passes below it a couple of 

 miles to the north. These remains have long attracted the attention of 

 antiquaries, William Camden having written of the ' quadrangular fort ' 

 as early as the days of Queen Elizabeth. 1 



The camp is oblong in form, lying north-west by south-east, and 

 encloses an area of about 7 acres ; its two longest sides are parallel to 

 one another, and its extant corners are slightly rounded rectangles. The 

 ramparts are well preserved on three sides, but on the fourth, that to the 

 south-east, they are much worn. They consist of a single bank, about 

 20 feet broad at the base and now only about 6 feet high ; outside of this 

 is a ditch, well marked upon the north-west side and fairly so along the 

 south-west, where it contains water, but only just traceable elsewhere. 

 Two hundred and fifty years ago, when Dugdale knew them, the de- 

 fences were evidently much more imposing, as he writes of ' Rampires 

 whose Height and Largenesse do still shew the Strength ' of the fort. 

 Bartlett also, as late as 1777, speaks of 'high ramparts still in full per- 

 fection.' There are now three openings through the ramparts into the 

 interior area, one at the north corner, one in the middle of the north- 

 west side and a third near the west corner ; but it is difficult to deter- 

 mine whether any of these represent ancient entrances. Dugdale records 

 certain interesting discoveries made in his day, apparently within the 

 area of the camp. He says that ' on the North Part of this Fort have 

 been found by plowing divers Flint Stones, about four Inches and a half 

 in Length, curiously wrought by Grinding, or some such Way, into the 

 Form here exprest.' He then gives a drawing of what is apparently a 

 Neolithic celt, and which he says was deposited in the museum of Elias 

 Ashmole at Oxford. 



This camp has often been described as Roman, and Salmon, in his 

 Survey of Roman Antiquities, even placed the Man- 

 duessedum of Antonine's Itinerary here. But there 

 is nothing to substantiate these statements ; on 

 the contrary Manduessedum was upon the Watling 

 Street at Mancetter just below, and general ap- 

 pearances, as well as the above recorded finds, 

 certainly point to a prehistoric origin for these \| %2iJ* If 



earthworks. 2 WKiasssa' 



HOB'S MOAT. See Solihull. 



ILMINGTON (7 miles south of Stratford-on- 

 Avon). High up the hill above this village, and 



about three-quarters of a mile south-west of the ,. ****** OVT 

 parish church is a small double moated enclosure IVIXJN \y i (JIM 



locally called ' The Camp.' It is in a large open SCALE or FEET 



field known as Nebsworth, which crowns the top ? ..-'?- .. z , 3 ? 



1 Camden's Brit. (Gibson ed. 1695), p. 510. 



1 Dugdale's Wane. p. 765 ; Michel's Leicestershire, vol. iv. p. 1029 ; Bloxam in B'ham. and Mid. 

 Inst. Arch. Tram. (1875), PP- 3 2 > 33 ! Burgess in ditto (1872), p. 88, and in Brit. Arch. Assoc. Journ. 

 (1873), p. 43 ; Langford's Staffs, and Warvi. vol. ii. pp. 128, 392. 



I 377 48 



