A HISTORY OF ESSEX 



N 



(pa flr Eadweard cyn'mg mid sumum his fultume on Eastseaxe to Mteldune f wlcode 

 peer }>a hwile J>e man pa burh worhte y getimbrede tet Witbam?) 



(Then went King Edward with some of his force to Maldon in Essex, and there 

 encamped, while the burh at Witham was being wrought and built.) 



The second (A. 920) reference is as follows : 



(Her on pys gere foran to middum sumera for Eadweard cyn'mg to Mteldune & 

 getimbrede j)a burg is" gestaffolode <sr he ponon fore.) 



(In this year, before Midsummer, King Edward went to Maldon, and built and 

 established the burg, ere he went thence.) 



WITHAM BURY. Some sixty years ago, when little interest was 

 taken in such relics of past history, the Eastern Counties railway was 

 cut through the heart of this fortress, which is second to none to those 

 who are interested in England's story unfolded in the pages of the Saxon 

 Chronicle ; for there we read of King Edward staying in Maldon in 

 A. 9 1 3 while this burb was being constructed. 



Road-makers and gravel-diggers have for long aided in the work 



of its destruction, till only 

 fragments remain of the 

 burh that Edward ivorbte & 

 getimbrede at Witham. 



The best modern ac- 

 count of this earthwork was 



i // T^ \ \ written by Mr. F. C. J. 



/ I /* \ I Spurrell. 1 His paper gives a 



plan showing, in addition to 

 the ramparts which are plain 

 to the eye of the passer-by, 

 the course of the destroyed 

 works, traced by Mr. Spurrell 

 when in winter visits he was 

 able to follow their line. 



The original fort seems 

 to have consisted of a large 

 enclosure of about 400 by 

 350 yards, with an inner ward 

 or keep 200 by 175 yards. 



If this could be regarded as the typical form for a royal military 

 burh of the period, much importance would be added to traces thereof. 



Mr. Spurrell (to whose courtesy we are indebted for the basis of 

 our plan, in which the black lines signify banks) says : 



On the south-west side, or that on which the River Panta runs, the hillside is 

 very steep ; on the other sides the land slopes gently from the middle of the camp. 

 . . . The ditches were dry ; about thirty feet wide, and of slight depth. ... I 

 should think that, measured from the inside, the average height [of the banks] was 

 seven feet. 



1 Essex Naturalist, 1887, i. 19. 

 288 



Enhances? 



