45 



on tljc Iparlbtougl Jffforos " 



By the Eev. A. C. Smith, M.A. 



[Read before the Society at the Annual Meeting at Marlborough, August 12th, 1879,] 



HE district which the Society visits this year is (I venture to 

 say) the richest in British remains of any in our county ; 

 and 1 say this advisedly, not forgetting Stonehenge and the ac- 

 cumulation of barrows and other earthworks surrounding it : but 

 on the Marlborough Downs we not only possess specimens of almost 

 every variety of British stone and earthworks which have come 

 down to our times ; but, in several instances, such admirable ex- 

 amples as we shall look for in vain thus congregated together in 

 any other spot in our county ; and if not in our county, then not in 

 England generally, for where else shall we look for British remains 

 which can be compared with those which Wiltshire exhibits ? 



This is no mere opinion of my own taken up for the occasion : 

 but our great pioneer in the antiquities of our county, Sir Richard 

 Colt Hoare, in his magnificent work on North Wilts, wrote, 1 " In 

 no part of Wiltshire are British antiquities more frequent or in- 

 teresting than in the immediate neighbourhood of Marlborough, a 

 circumstance which may probably arise from its vicinity to the grand 

 sanctuary at Abury " ; and again in the same volume, 2 " To whatever 

 point we direct our steps in the neighbourhood of Marlborough, 

 we shall find objects, either of British or Roman antiquity, to in- 

 stigate our spirit of research, and to attract our enquiry." While 

 in reference to the Roman sera he adds, 3 "Marlborough and its 

 neighbourhood are the most interesting places which, as an antiquary, 



1 Page 34. 



2 Page 13. 



3 Page 89. 



