144 



u Sculptured Stone at Codford St. Peter" 8fc. 



It seems humiliating that three combined, well sculptured, four- 

 teenth century coats, even without tinctures, should remain enveloped 

 in the mists of conjecture. 



I am informed by an old inhabitant of Warminster that the 

 London Inn was built about 1818, upon the site of a former small 

 inn called " Search Hope/'' which was burnt down and had been 

 insured in the Sun Fire Office. Under the heading "The Searce 

 hoop Inn/'' I find that a lease was granted by Sir Edward Hungerford 

 the 1st of June, 1678, to Jeffery, Eyton, of a messuage or tenement 

 on the north part of High Street, and a close of meadow or pasture 

 adjoining there, &c. This would appear to be a long time after the 

 disappearance of the above-mentioned mansion. 



It is said that the stone was found when " The Searce hoop Inn " 

 was pulled down, that is, when the ruins were being removed after 

 the fire. 1 



It may be well to recapitulate the points which have now been 

 ascertained in the history of this heraldic stone : — 



1. From the heraldic devices sculptured on the front, and the 

 shaping of the back, it is clear that in the fourteenth century it was 

 the lintel of a high chimney-piece in a lordly mansion. 



£. In 1818 it is found in the debris of " The Searce Hoop Inn," 

 and is built into the London Inn in two pieces as old material. 



3. In 1857 it is found in pulling down the London Inn, and 

 built into the boundary wall of the Athenaeum for preservation. 



4. In 1877 attention is called to it by the meeting of the Wilts 

 Archaeological Society at Warminster. 



5. In 1879, upon the pulling down of the said boundary wall, 

 it is built into the wall over one of the main entrances of the Bleeck 

 Memorial Hall, then in the course of erection at the Warminster 

 Athenaeum. 



I commend the name, " The Searce hoop Inn," to the students of 

 signs. 



J. Baeon. 



1 Cf . Hist, of Warminster, by Kev. J. J. Daniell, ch. xviii., p. 48 ; Warminster 

 Coates, 1879. 



