338 



The Ancient Wiltshire Di/Jces. 



to a portion of this Grimsdyke, and indicates its western course. 

 Close by that point you have Vernditch (or Verndyke), in the 

 present parish of Broad-Chalk, for the meaning of which name we 

 may refer our readers to a previous page of this number of the 

 Magazine (p. 269). Then next, in a charter 1 relating to Downton, 

 an immediately adjoining parish, you have more than one allusion 

 to " the dyke/' as a boundary-point, an expression that probably 

 refers to some portion of this Grimsdyke, since in a charter relating 

 to an estate at Fyrstfleld (Frustesfeld) belonging to the Abbess of 

 Wilton (now termed the Earldoms), we meet with the more exact 

 description "of 3arn wege on 3a ealdan die," i.e., "from that way 

 to the old dyke." 2 So that we may fairly infer that at all events 

 this dyke, of which we are now writing, ran from what we now call 

 Bishopston to Yernclyke, thence along a portion of the Downton 

 boundary, and thence to what is now designated " the Earldoms/' 

 and forming a portion of the northern boundary of this manor, it 

 then stretched onward to the north-east, till it came near a place 

 which takes its name from it, viz., Grimestead, within comparatively 

 recent times corrupted into Grinstead. 



III. — Grimsdyke, to the north of Salisbury. 



This dyke can also be traced, by means of ancient charters* 

 westward to within some two miles of Bokerly Hill, to which 

 allusion has been already made. Thus in a charter relating to 

 Sherrington 3 we have the southern boundary thus described ; 

 ff -Son on Grimesdic, andlang die " (then to Grimsdyke, along 

 the dyke, &c) . In one relating to the next parish, Stockton, you 

 again find the description " on dic-geat -Set west andlang die on* 

 Wylle-weg 4 " i.e., "to the dyke-gate (^entrance), then west along 

 the dyke to the Welsh-way " (or British trackway) . Indeed you 

 can clearly trace the dyke at this point to the present day. It 

 would there seem to have been utilized as a southern boundary for 



1 Cod. Dipl., 1108, 2 Ibid, 395. 



& See Sir R. C. Hoare's " Registrum "Wiltunense," p, 13, 

 *Cod. Dipl., 1078, 



