Strutt’s Delicice Sylvoarum. 387 
respect to the Warwickshire Arden, little or nothing is known 
on the subject. That it ever had any claims to the name or 
legal character of a forest, as Mr. Strutt, on no better autho- 
rity than the poet Drayton, leaves us to infer, we very much 
doubt, or rather entirely disbelieve. "To some this may per- 
haps appear a startling assertion; however, it is not hastily 
made. ‘* Arden” is supposed by Whitaker to mean a great 
wood; and there can be no doubt that a certain distri ne in 
Warwickshire, comprehending probably the Woodland in 
opposition to the Feldon, was ae called ; from whence Turkil 
de Arden acquired his appellation, and the distant vills of 
Weston in Arden and Hampton in Arden their adjunctive 
distinction ; but that its magnitude corresponded with the 
poet Drayton’s verse, as quoted by Mr. Strutt, 
** Her one hand touching Trent, the other Severn’s side,” 
is not to be believed for a moment; nor dare we place any 
more reliance on the “ Map of the Arden,” in Bartlett’s 
Manduessedum. ‘That the district in question was woodland 
generally, is clear from the circumstance of lands in the time 
of Henry the Third being sold “ per magnam mensuram de 
Ardenne,” the woodland measure long continuing to be larger 
than that which was applied in meting other lands, There 
are, indeed, smatterers in antiquarian. lore, who scruple not 
to men that the present names of certain parishes in 
Warwickshire still serve to point out the boundaries of the 
ancient Forest of Arden. ‘Thus they assert, and so far assert 
truly, that there runs through a portion of the county, com- 
mencing from the north, and extending in a south-easterly 
direction, an uninterrupted line of parishes, the names of 
which terminate in “ ley,” as, e. g. Badesley, Baxterley, 
Ansley, Arley, Astley, Fillongley, Corley, Allesley, &c. And 
these, we are required to believe, constituted what they choose 
to call the ley or lay lands of the forest, situate on its out- 
skirts, meaning by that term the cultivated lands, or those 
employed for agricultural purposes, in contradistinction to the 
uncultivated or woodland tracts. All this, we hesitate not to 
say, is in our opinion mere antiquarian quackery ; the termi- 
nation of these names having about as much to do with 
defining the boundaries of the forest as it has with determin- 
ing the. source and direction of the mysterious Niger. The 
tr van we believe, is, as we are compelled to state, and have 
above pretty broadly hinted, that the Warwickshire Forest of 
Arden never was, in fact, any forest at all; but that the dis- 
trict, being generally woodland (as already stated), acquired 
the appellation of forest in contradistinction to the more open 
country. 
