A HISTORY OF BERKSHIRE 



EAST HAGBOURNE. Considerable remains of a moat surround the 

 manor house at East Hagbourne ; rather more than three sides of a 

 square still exist, and several additional ditches of the same or smaller 

 dimensions. 



KINTBURY. A fine circular moat surrounds the site of Balsdon 

 manor house, and outside this again are the remains of a narrower ditch 

 or moat, forming part of an irregular pentagon. 1 



Near Anvilles Farm is an irregularly shaped moat, within which 

 stood formerly the house of Anvilles or Hamville. 



LETCOMBE REGIS. A very complete rectangular moat surrounds 

 the moat house at Letcombe Regis. 



SOUTH MORETON. The remains of a very irregular, pear-shaped 

 moat are to be seen near the old manor house of Saunderville. 



READING. A very perfect moat, square in form and thirty feet 

 wide, surrounds the manor house of Southcot in the parish of St. Mary's, 

 Reading. 8 



RUSCOMBE. There is a quadrilateral moat with straight and regular 

 sides in Botany Bay copse by Stanlake Park. It is thought that the 

 manor house formerly stood within it. 



EAST SHEFFORD. One side of the moat which formerly surrounded 

 the manor house is still existing. It is said that the moat once enclosed 

 the house and garden. 8 



SHINFIELD. The remains of a small rectangular moat are to be 

 seen in a field opposite the vicarage. 



In Moorwood, near Daffodil Wood, is a great number of moats, 

 the object of which it is not easy to discover. The wood is divided up 

 into two rows of quadrangles by moats running at right-angles to one 

 another, and within these quadrangles are two other quadrangular moats, 

 one within the other. 



SHOTTESBROOK. The greater part of a moat is still in existence 

 around Smewins Farm, which is supposed to have been the residence 

 of Prince Arthur, elder son of Henry VII. 4 



SOTWELL. An irregularly rectangular moat still surrounds Sotwell 

 Farm, though on the south-west it is little more than a ditch. 



There are a series of ditches, one eighteen feet wide, with others 

 parallel and at right angles to it, in the orchard at Stonor Hayes. Some 

 fragments of a pavement were found to the south-east, the remains of 

 a former building. 



STANFORD IN THE VALE. There is in this parish an irregularly 

 square moat surrounding what is called Stanford Park Island. 



STEVENTON. There is a moat or fish pond, about 1 5 feet wide and 

 somewhat winding in shape, partially surrounding the site of the priory. 

 It is still filled with water from a neighbouring stream. 



1 Lysons, Mag. Brit. i. 305. Trans. Newbury Dist. Field Club, i. 132. 

 " Berks, Bucks and Oxon Arch. Journ. vii. 94. 



3 History of Newbury and its Environs, 276. 



4 Cough's Camden, 233. Ashmole, Antiq. Berks, ii. 505. 



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