A HISTORY OF BERKSHIRE 



overlooks. This White Horse belongs to an extremely interesting class 

 of gigantic hill-side figures, formed by cutting away the green turf so as 

 to expose the white chalk beneath. Examples in the shape of horses, 

 and others in the forms of human giants, and crosses, occur in Sussex, 

 Dorset, Buckinghamshire, Warwickshire, Wiltshire and Yorkshire. 



In the year 1738 the Rev. Francis Wise, B.D., published A letter 

 to Dr. Mead concerning some antiquities in Berkshire, particularly showing 

 that the White Horse, which gives name to the great Vale or Valley which 

 it overlooks is a monument of the West Saxons, made in memory of a great 

 Victory obtained over the Danes A.D. 871. The particular event to 

 which this monument is referred by the writer is the Battle of Ashdown, 

 but the evidence upon whi:h his opinion is founded is of a character 

 which most antiquaries of the present day would regard as inconclusive 

 and quite inadequate to prove the Anglo-Saxon origin of the White 

 Horse. 



Wayland Smith's Cave, to which reference has been made in 

 another part of this article, is considered by Mr. Wise to be of Danish 

 origin. Mr. Wise's opinions did not by any means meet with the 

 approval of his contemporaries, and he was attacked by a writer under 

 the pseudonym ' Philalethes Rusticus ' in 1740, in a tract entitled The 

 impertinence and imposture of modern antiquaries displayed; or a refutation 

 of the Reverend Mr. Wise's letter to Dr. Mead concerning the White Horse, 

 and other antiquities in Berkshire. An anonymous defence said to be from 

 the pen of the Rev. George North was issued in 1741, and in the 

 following year Mr. Wise published Further observations upon the White 

 Horse and other antiquities in Berkshire, etc. 



The subject of this extremely interesting class of ancient monu- 

 ments of which the Uffington White Horse is the best-known example 

 in the kingdom has, therefore, exercised the minds of antiquaries for a 

 good many years. The fashion among antiquaries of the eighteenth 

 century was to assign them to the Anglo-Saxon period, although the 

 evidence upon which such an assumption was based does not at the 

 present time seem at all clear. The Uffington White Horse itself 

 perhaps furnishes the strongest clue as to the period to which the turf- 

 monuments of England should be assigned. 



Of the six or seven monuments of this kind representing horses, 

 that at Uffington is probably nearest to the original form ; most, if not 

 all, of the others having been much modified in recent times; whilst 

 some of them are possibly of entirely recent date. The Uffington 

 White Horse, therefore, has a special value of its own. Upon compar- 

 ing its attenuated and disjointed form with those represented on ancient 

 British coins one cannot fail to be struck by the resemblance. Indeed, 

 the similarity of general form is so marked as to form a strong reason 

 for assigning the group of turf or hill-side monuments to which the 

 White Horse at Uffington belongs to the period when the ancient British 

 coins were in vogue. The form of the figure will best be appreciated 

 from the accompanying diagram which is the result of an actual survey. 



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