A HISTORY OF WARWICKSHIRE 



Sections of the ramparts from the above-named plan are here 

 given, from which it will be seen that the interior area of the camp 

 is raised above the neighbouring ground level some 6 to 8 feet upon 



the north and west sides, 

 and as much as 40 feet on 

 the south along the banks 

 of the river ; the remnants 

 of a vallum are shown upon 

 the top of the works on the 

 north and west sides, but no 

 ditches ; the latter have 

 probably been filled up at 

 some time or other by 



WAPPENBURY, local cultivators of the soil, 



about A.Q. 1830 after Bloxam I t will thus be seen 



that the church and the 



few houses which stand near it are in the interior of a roughly parallel- 

 sided oblong entrenchment ; the churchyard lies rather south of the 

 central point of this, and from it three ancient roads, now in two instances 

 little more than field lanes, take their courses approximately in the direc- 

 tion of west, north and east ; according to the old Bloxam plan there 

 appears to have been a fourth road leading south to the river, passing 

 by some buildings to the south-west of the church. 



These earthworks were considered by Bloxam, Burgess and others, 

 to be Roman, 1 on account of the oblong form of the area enclosed, and 

 of the position of the church and roads radiating therefrom ; but unless 

 we accept a vague report of Roman tiles having been found to the south 

 of the churchyard, no discoveries of antiquities appear to have been 

 made here to give support to the theory, and the works may possibly 

 be of very much later date. 



WARWICK. The magnificent mediaeval castle here is built upon 

 ancient earthworks of the moated mount and court type. These origi- 

 nal fortifications have probably been more or less modified by the 

 erection of the later defences of masonry, but the great mount itself 

 remains unaltered, and is a very prominent object, and the ditches pro- 

 tecting its courtyard are still distinctly traceable. 



The site of this ancient fortress is upon a rocky elevation over- 

 hanging the north-west bank of the river Avon. The high grassy mount 

 which formed the ' keep ' rises at the south-west of the earthworks, 

 and about 120 feet away from the river ; it is conical in shape and, as 

 usual, truncated at the top ; it measures about 200 feet in diameter at its 

 base, and about 60 feet at its summit ; remnants of the surrounding 

 fosse are still to be seen, more distinctly upon the western side. The 

 walls of the present castle now enclose a portion of the mount, and the 



Burgess in B'ham. and Mid. Inst. Arch. Trans. (1872), p. 87, and in Arch. Journ. vol. xxxiii. 

 (1876), p. 374. ; Bloxam in B'ham. and Mid. Inst. Arch. Tram. (1875), p. 31. 



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