By the Rev. Canon J. E. Jackson, F.S.A. 



55 



are said to have done. If I may presume to imitate a well-known 

 passage in one of Cicero's orations, in which he sums up the various 

 places that competed for the glory of having been Homer's birth- 

 place, I may say that Camden, Sir Richard Hoare, and others place 

 JEthandun beyond all doubt at Edington, near Westbury; Milner is 

 clamorous for Heddington, near Calne; Whitaker of Manchester, 

 Beke, and Thurnam, insist upon Yatton Down, near Chippenham, 

 where, moreover, the late Mr. Poulett Scrope actually built a tower, 

 with an inscription, to put an end to all strife. Barker maintains it 

 was at Edington, near Hungerford. Other Berkshire antiquaries 

 vociferate for Yattenden, in Berkshire; and latest of all comes 

 Bishop Clifford, of Clifton, contending, and with very strong- 

 argument indeed — that it was neither in Wilts, nor in Berks, but 

 at Edington, near Bridgwater, in Somersetshire. Now I am sure 

 that if five eminent counsel were each to take up one of these cases 

 they would severally be able to produce such overwhelming reasons 

 in favour of each to perplex and bewilder you that you would 

 bounce out of the situation as King James I. did, after hearing 

 first one and then another, by declaring that they were every 

 one of them right. But as that cannot be, and as only one can 

 be right, though it is not for me to venture to pronounce which 

 that is, I do feel obliged to say that I cannot understand how 

 it could possibly have been at your Edington. It would take 

 a deal of time to go through all the jjtos and cons of this much- 

 agitated question : so I will just say a few words why your Edington 

 does not appear to me to fit the case. The names for Alfred's resting- 

 places in his advance from the Isle of Athelney must be conjectures 

 in every one of the six competing explanations ; but, in that which 

 brings him to your Edington, his stages and quarters for the night 

 are not only conjectures, but wholly unfitted to the circumstances. 

 You all know Brixton Deverel, a little way beyond Warminster, 

 and Cley Hill. Well, according to this theory, Alfred, having 

 passed one night with his army at Brixton, set off as soon as it was 

 light, reached Cley Hill, and passed the next night there. Now 

 the distance from Brixton to Cley Hill, as the crow flies, is just 

 four miles, by the road say five or six. It seems highly improbable 



