A HISTORY OF WARWICKSHIRE 



Britons and some to the Romans, Camden even making them an im- 

 aginary military station which he called Secandunum, an unfortunate 

 statement which has been frequently repeated by local writers down to 

 the present day ; others again have considered the mound to be a sepul- 

 chral tumulus, and apportioned it as a burial place for the slain in the 

 great battle which was fought here 755 A.D. But all these surmises are 

 incorrect, and though history is apparently silent as to its actual maker, 

 there is no doubt that these very perfect earthworks are the remains of 

 the moated mount and court castle of some Saxon or Norman lord of 

 Seckington. Dugdale records that the villagers in his day still called the 

 work ' the Castle.' It is further evident that this castle, like the strong- 

 holds at Brinklow, at Kineton and at Castle Bromwich, must somewhat 

 early in its existence have fallen into disuse, as no walls of stone were 

 ever subsequently erected upon the earthworks to take the place of the 

 original palisades of wood. 1 



SELLY OAK. See Edgbaston. 



SHELDON (near Birmingham). In the north-west corner of this 

 parish and about half a mile to the east of the adjoining village ofYardley 



is an irregular oblong entrenchment known 

 as Kent's Moat. In contradistinction to the 

 usual moat in a hollow, this earthwork is 

 situated upon slightly elevated ground. Its 

 defences enclose an area of about an acre 

 and a half ; they consist of an inner rampart 

 and an outer ditch, neither of which are 

 now as formidable as they probably once 

 were, owing to the effects of several hundred 

 years' denudation. There are no signs of 

 buildings within the area, and Hutton, at 

 the end of the eighteenth century, wrote 

 that local tradition had then quite lost the 

 recollection of any ; the edifice which must 

 once have existed there was probably only 

 of wood. 2 



SOLIHULL (south of Birmingham). 

 There are remains of what was once a camp 

 of large size, situated at Solihull Lodge at 

 the extreme west of this parish, and on the 

 left bank of the little river Cole. A century 

 ago it seems to have been called ' Danes' 

 Camp,' but it is now known as the ' Berry 

 Mound.' 



The earthworks are upon a low-lying 



... Kent's Moat 



\~4lV\\t\\i\ 





Section 



SHELDON 



SCALE or FEET 

 too 200 



300 



1 Dugdale's Wane. p. 799 ; Clark in Arch. Inst. Journ. xxxix. p. 372, B'ham. and Mid. Inst. 

 Arch. Tram. (1900), p. 89 ; Burgess in ditto (1872), p. 85, and in Brit. Arch. Assoc. Journ. (1873) pp. 

 39, 43 ; Timmins's Warn. pp. 4, 61. 



Mutton's B'ham. p. 418; Burgess in B'ham and Mid. Inst. Arch. Trani. (1872), p. 88. 



392 



