ANCIENT EARTH- WORKS. 115 



directly from the river bed, the slopes of which are as steep as 

 those of the Keep hill of Launceston Castle. The trackway to 

 its entrance, which faces the north-east and steepest side, winds 

 around from the south-west and passes along the bottom of the 

 ditch outside the high earth rampart that encircles the whole 

 hill top. It has an inside area of 650 by 400 feet. 



From the foregoing account it will be noted that there is 

 scarcely a parish in the district which has not one or more old 

 village sites within its boundary, also that the four double- 

 ramparted areas in Warbstow, St. Kew, and Egloshayle are of 

 nearly the same design, and that they and the remaining single- 

 ramparted areas, with perhaps the exception of that on Kit Hill, 

 all probably had the same early origin, the simple wall of earth 

 and stones, with the ditch outside it, forming their defence. 



Of Cliff ramparts, with the exception of Tintagel headland, 

 concerning which the historian Leland exclaimed " Good Lord ! 

 what deep ditches, what precipices are here. I look upon it as a 

 very great wonder both of art and nature," there are few to 

 be seen within easy reach of Launceston, but further west they 

 are common. For instance, Little Dinas cliff, in St. Anthony, 

 has a dyked rampart across it enclosing a space 500 by 200 

 yards. Half-a-mile from Tehidy is another promontory cut off 

 on the land side by a double ramp and ditches. In St. Agnes is 

 an earth wall two miles long called 'the trench,' which is 20 feet 

 high in some parts, and has a ditch outside it 17 feet wide. It 

 extends from Forth Chapel Coombe to Breanick Coombe. 



Closely connected with all these old earthworks which so 

 clearly attest how numerous and industrious the ancients of 

 Cornwall were, are the burial mounds (called barrows, and 

 tumuli) of their dead, which abound in every part of the county, 

 and of which many have been described in the Journal of this 

 Institution. 



I will now attempt to describe the earth-fenced village site 

 which is nearest Launceston. It adjoins Kestle farm, in St. 

 Thomas parish (see plan) and is situated about 300 yards from 

 the road on the southern side of Tredidon lane, and occupies a 

 ridge which gradually rises from the Kensey river. The old 

 apjproach to it was by a trackway branching off from the Bodmin 



