OfOXFO %T>^S HI XE. 54.9 
kim^ met, and overthrew him here about Burford^ winning his 
Banner wherein there was depided a^o/</^/z Dragon^ ; in memo- 
ry of which Vi^ory-^ perhaps the (yet within memory) of 
making a Dragon yearly, and carrying it up and down ihtTown 
in great jollity on Midfummer Eve, to which (I know not fof 
what reafon) they added a Gyant^ might likely enough be firft 
inftituted. 
117. After the Conqueft^ I find it the ' Town of Robert Earl of 
Glocefter^ bafe SontoKingfJ^wrj' the Firft, to whofe Son William 
I have feen an Original Cl}ar ter grzmed him by King Henr, 2. gi- 
ving to this his Town of Bureford^ Gildam isf omnes confuetudines 
quas habent liberi Burgenfes de Oxeneford ; moft of which it has 
fince loft, and chiefly by the over-ruling power of Sk Lawrence 
Tanfield^ Lord chief Baron in Queen Elizabeths time : Yet it ftill 
retains the face of a Corf oration^ having a common Seal^ is^c. the 
very fame with Henley^ as defcribed in the Map^ if they difFef not 
in colours, which I could not learn. 
118. As for If udu/Ioke^ or WudeHoc^ ^'jx. pu&ertoc (i. e.locm 
fylvejlris) now Woodjiock^ it feems to have been a feat Royal ewer 
fince the days of King /Elfred, it appearing by a MS. in Sir J^ohn 
Cotton's Library , that he tranflated Boetim de Confolatione 
PbilofophidC^lheie^. Nay, fo confiderable was it in the time 
of \\ing Mtheldred, that he called a Parliament there, and En- 
abled Laws^ to be feen amongft that colleSilion of ancient Laws fet 
forth by }Ar, Lamb ard ^.Whence it may almoftbe certainly conclu- 
ded, that here muft have been a houfe of the Kings of England^long 
before the days of King Henry the Firft ; who yet 'tis like indeed 
was the firft that inclofed the Park, with a wall^ though not for 
Peer, but all foreign TP/W f^uchzs Lyons^ Leopards., Camels, 
Linx's, which he procured abroad of other Princes; amongft 
which more particularly, fays William of Malmesbury.^ he kept a 
Porcupine^ hif^idi6 fetps cooper tam^ quas in Canes infeSiantes natura- 
liter emittunt^^ i.e. cover'dover with fharp pointed Quills^which 
they naturally flioot at the dogslh^l hunt them. 
119. Of the Town of Thame^ anciently Tamej-pop&a, I could 
find little, till about the time of Edward Senior^ An. 921, when 
the J)anijh Army out of Huntingdon came hither and erefted feme 
y Camd Britan inCom.Qxon. » MS.inBMoth. Cottomava-, fuhOthons A * AfX'f^'>*<'iJ^io'-Gul. Lam- 
bard ^ Wtll.Malmesbmenj, deHenr.i. lih-'i. 
kind 
