1 68 THE EXETER ROAD 



and fertile plains. These tribes lieaped up the first 

 artificial earthworks that ever strengthened this 

 historic hill, and they were succeeded during the long 

 march of those dim centuries by Romans, Saxons, 

 and Danes. The Romans, with their unerring 

 military instinct, saw the importance of the hill, and 

 added to the simple defences they found there. They 

 called the place Sorhiodumim,, and made it a great 

 strategic station. The Saxons streno;tliened the 

 fortifications in their turn, and at the time of the 

 Norman Concpiest a city had grown up under the 

 shelter of the citadel. 



In its deserted state to-day, the site of Old Sarum 

 vividly recalls the appearance presented by an extinct 

 volcano, the conical hill rising from the downs with 

 the suddenness of an upheaval, and the area enclosed 

 within the concentric rings of banks and ditches 

 forming a hollow space similar to a crater. The total 

 area enclosed within these fortifications is about 28 

 acres. Within this space was comprised that ancient 

 city, and in its very centre, overlooking everything 

 else, and encompassed by a circular fosse and bank, 

 100 feet in height, stood the citadel. The site of this 

 castle is now overgrown with dense thickets of 

 shrubs and brambles ; the fragments of its flint and 

 rubble walls, 12 feet thick, and some remaining 

 portions of its gateways aff'ording evidence of its old- 

 time strength. 



Within this city, enclosed for centuries by the 

 ring-fence of these fortifications, stood the cathedral, 

 in a position just below the Castle ward. Its exact 

 site and size (although not a fragment of it is 



