By the Rev. W. H. Jones. 



291 



confirmation of the accuracy of the etymology suggested for Don- 

 head. From Lower Donhead the line of the Parish goes by what 

 is called the twelve acres {be twelf aceron.) Now in Anglo-Saxon, 

 the word 'cecer' denotes primarily a field without regard to its size, 

 like the Latin ' ager/ and it is only in a secondary sense that it is 

 used to denote a measure of land. We are not therefore surprised 

 to find that this portion of the parish boundary (which we can 

 very accurately identify) is of much larger extent than what we 

 now understand by twelve acres ; in fact, the real measurement is 

 some 35 acres. But this is the point of interest connected with it, 

 that, to this very day, the plot of ground retains the original name 

 of " the tivelve acres" which it bore 900 years ago. 



From an expression in the charter, we should expect to find near 

 this spot, as is indeed the case not far from old Wardour Castle, 

 the remains of an old British, or Roman road ; the word 'weal-wege,' 

 which is employed, denoting its having once existed in this 

 vicinity. From this 'old road' the boundary line touches 

 several places, the names of which cannot now be recognised, along 

 ' a hedge row,' which is certainly to be identified with the hedge on 

 a ridge leading from Wardour to the Nodder, and which is still a 

 parish boundary. Thence it goes to Semene (Semley), — Rodelee, 

 — Sapcumbe, — and Poleslegh, and so to Mare-broc (i.e. the bound- 

 ary brook), a small stream which, for a few hundred yards, bounds 

 the parish still. Then the line proceeds to Cnugel (Knoyle), — - 

 Hicklesham, — Funtgeal (Fonthill), — Gificancumbe (Gifcombe?), 

 and other places to Fintes-Ridge (now called simply 'Ridge'), till it 

 again reaches the brook by Chilmark, the point from which we 

 started on our supposed parochial perambulation. Some of the names 

 of places which have been mentioned are no longer familiar to you. 

 They are given in the hope of some one acquainted with the 

 locality beiug able to supply information sufficient to identify one 

 or more of them. 



In the same charter from which the particulars just given have 

 been derived, Kiug Ethelred restores to the Abbey of Shaftesbury 

 a place called by the unpronounceable name, Sfgcnyllebar, 

 What its real name was, or where it was situated, I cannot say. It 



