lo THE HISTORY OF NEWMARKET. [Book I. 



very bold and perfect, about a quarter of a mile south of the 

 turnpike gate, which stands where it is crossed by the high 

 road from Newmarket to London and Cambridge. I ob- 

 tained, in a rough way, the following measurements, which 

 cannot, however, greatly err from the truth. 



This formidable vallum or rampart was commenced 

 probably at its southern extremity, where the Ordnance map 

 of Cambridgeshire marks the site of an ancient entrenched 

 camp at Wood Ditton ; there are also some tumuli northward 

 of that place in front of the dyke, called, traditionally, " The 

 Two Captains." Wood Ditton is evidently a name associated 

 with the dyke, implying the wood on the ditch. The work 

 is continued northward, across Newmarket Heath, in a 

 straight course of eight miles, to a stream near the village 

 of Reach, whose appellation, from the Saxon, poecan, indi- 

 cates the point to which the dyke reached or extended (see 

 the Plan), so that its right flank rested on streams and marsh 

 lands, and its left on a forest tract. The vallum being thrown 

 up on the eastern side, shows that the entrenchment was in- 

 tended to secure the plain of Newmarket against an enemy 

 approaching from the westward by a barrier, impregnable if 

 properly defended. Such, indeed, it must have been, for the 

 escarpment of the rampire from the bottom of the ditch in 

 the most perfect places measures not less than ninety feet, 

 and is inclined at an angle of seventy degrees. On the top 

 of the rampart is a cursus, or way, eighteen feet in breadth, 

 sufficiently wide for the passage of cavalry or chariots. I 

 have been told that, some years since, fragments of bronze 

 furniture of chariot wheels were dug up near the line of dyke, 

 but I cannot verify the information. On the top of the 

 rampart I thought I could distinguish faint traces of a 

 parapet of turf The whole was probably strengthened by a 

 line of palisades or stakes. It will be readily imagined how 

 strong a defence this steep and bristled wall of earth must 

 then have formed. Even now, to ascend its outward base 

 from the bottom of the ditch is a feat of no small difficulty 

 and labour. The excavation for the work was made in the solid 

 stratum of chalk, which lies on Newmarket Plain next under 



