TAB. I. frontispiece.

Stukeley del.

E. Kirkall sculp.

The Groundplot
of the Brittish
Temple now the
town of
Aubury Wilts.
Ao. 1724

ABURY,
A
TEMPLE
OF THE
British DRUIDS,
With Some Others,
DESCRIBED.

Wherein is a more particular account of the first and patriarchal
religion; and of the peopling the British Islands.

———Quamvis obstet mihi tarda vetustas,

Multaque me fugiant primis spectata sub annis,

Plura tamen memini—— Ov. Met. XII. v. 182.

By WILLIAM STUKELEY, M.D.
Rector of All-Saints in Stamford.

LONDON:

Printed for the Author: And Sold by W. Innys, R. Manby, B. Dod,
J. Brindley, and the Booksellers in London.

M DCC XLIII.

CONTENTS.

To the Right Honourable
HENRY
EARL of PEMBROKE, &c. &c.

Right Honourable,

IN a family that has been in all ages remarkably the friend of the muses, I think myself happy, that I have a particular claim. To You, my Lord, this dedication is devolv’d by hereditary right. Through Your father’s auspices and encouragement, I began and continued the work. He was ever pleas’d to look upon my mean performances with a favourable eye; and to assist me out of the inexhaustible fund of his own knowledge, in all kinds of ancient learning; and promised to patronize it, when published.

But if any thing herein be acceptable to the publick, they are indebted to Your Lordship for its appearing abroad sooner than I intended myself. Out of that innate love of letters which warms the breast of the Pembrokes, You thought fit to prompt and encourage me to the printing of it; and Your Lordship’s judgment will be an agreeable prejudice in my favour; who have cultivated Your excellent talents by your own industry; by all that can be learn’d in a curious view and observation of the antiquities of Italy; who are in every sense a master of that immense treasure of Greek and Roman marbles, which render Wilton the Tramontane Rome.

Besides that learning which is the ornament of the present age, Your Lordship knows how to put a true value on the antiquities proper to Your own country. If they want somewhat of the delicacy of the Augustan times, or that of Alexander the great; yet they have their beauties, and even elegancies, which affect so exquisite a taste as Your Lordship’s. A symmetry and harmony of parts, an amazing grandeur in the design, the incredible force of the mechanick powers employ’d in them, the most magnificent effect produc’d, will for ever recommend the works of the Druids, to those of Your Lordship’s discerning eye and accurate judgment.

We see a convincing demonstration of this, in the fine and costly model of Stonehenge, which Your Lordship introduces in the garden at Wilton; where, I may be bold to say, it shines amidst the splendours of Inigo Jones’s architecture; amidst what he did there in person, and what Your Lordship has since added, so agreeable to the former, as to render the design of that great genius complete.

So uncommon and unconfin’d is Your Lordship’s knowledge in architecture, particularly, that Great Britain beholds a bridge arising, chiefly under Your direction, superior to any the Roman power produc’d at the height of empire. And Thames, which so lately rescu’d the Danube from gallic tyranny, boasts of a nobler ornament than that which Trajan built across that famous river.

That commendable ardour of mind, which in Your younger years led you to study men and manners, places and things, in foreign countries, you now employ for the good of Your own; in the exercise of civil and military arts. Your Lordship tempers that love of liberty, which is the glory of government, with that just allegiance to the sovereign, which is the security of all; so as to give us a view of that amiable character of ancient english nobility, which adorns every page of british history. Permit me the honour to profess myself

Your Lordship’s

most faithful, and

most obedient

humble servant,

January 1, 1742-3.

William Stukeley.

PREFACE.

HISTORY is political wisdom, philosophy is religious. The one consists in the knowledge of memorable things, and application of that knowledge to the good conduct of life: in embracing the good, and avoiding the ill consequences and examples of actions. So the other teaches us to entertain worthy notions of the supreme being, and the studying to obtain his favour: which is the end of all human and divine wisdom. Religion is the means to arrive at this purpose. In order to be satisfied what is true religion, we must go up to the fountain-head as much as possible. The first religion undoubtedly is true, as coming immediately from God.

When I first began these studies about the Druid antiquities, I plainly discern’d, the religion profess’d in these places was the first, simple, patriarchal religion. Which made me judge it worth while to prosecute my enquiries about them, as a matter the most interesting and important. Knowledge is the glory of a man, divine knowledge of a christian. What I have done in this volume, is a further prosecution of the scheme I have laid down to this purpose. The noble person to whom it is dedicated, induc’d me to hasten the publication, suggesting the shortness of human life, and having a good opinion of the work.

I was willing to lay hold on the first opportunity of communicating to the world, the pleasure of contemplating so very noble antiquities, which we enjoy in our own island, before it be too late to see them. My endeavour in it is to open the times of first planting the world, after the flood; the propagation of true religion together with mankind; the deviation into idolatry; the persons that built the several kinds of patriarchal temples, such as we see here, in the more eastern parts of the world; the planters of Great Britain in particular; and the connexion there is between the east and west in matters of religion. All this shews there was but one religion at first, pure and simple.

Pausanias in Corinthiac. writes, “the Phliasians, one of the most ancient colonies in Greece, had a very holy temple, in which there was no image, either openly to be seen, or kept in secret.” He mentions the like of a grove or temple of Hebe, belonging to that people; and adds, “they give a mystical reason for it.” I guess the mystery to be, that it was after the first and patriarchal manner. The same author says in argol. “that at Prona is a temple of Vesta, no image, but an altar, on which they sacrifice.” The ancient Hetruscans ordain’d by a law, that there should be no statue in their temples. Lucian de dea Syr. writes, “the ancient temples in Egypt had no statues.” Plutarch, in Numa, and Clemens Alexan. strom. I. remark, “that Numa the second king of Rome, made express orders against the use of images, in the worship of the deity.” Plutarch adds, “that for the first 170 years after building the city, the Romans used no images, but thought the deity to be invisible.” So to the days of Silius Italicus and Philostratus, at the temple of Hercules our planter of Britain, at Gades, the old patriarchal method of religion was observ’d, as bishop Cumberland takes notice, Sanchoniathon, p. 266.

Sed nulla effigies, simulachrave nota deorum. Silius III.

And our british Druids had no images. And whatever we find in history, that looks like idolatry in them, is not to be referr’d to the aboriginal Druids, but to the later colonies from the continent.

Likewise I have open’d a large communication between the patriarchal family, of Abraham particularly, and of the first planters of the coasts on the ocean of Spain, Gaul, Germany and Britain. ’Tis plain, what religion was here first planted, as being an almost inaccessible island, flourished exceedingly, and kept up to its original system, even to the days of Cæsar, I mean among the aboriginal inhabitants. The new planters from the continent, on the southern and eastern shore of the island, were tinctured at least with idolatry, in the later times. Whilst on the continent, where more frequent changes of inhabitants happen, idolatry every where polluted it. But in all accounts of the first beginnings of nations, they had the first religion: ’till as every where, time, riches, politeness and prosperity bring on corruption in church and state.

We find, on the continent, idolatry crept on by degrees universally, which was the occasion of providence exerting its self in the Mosaick dispensation: and thereby changing the manner of these temples, altogether polluted. Nevertheless we have no reason to think but that the Druids, in this island of ours, generally kept up to the purity of their first and patriarchal institution. And that is the reason that all our classical writers, tho’ much later than the times we are treating of, represent them as a people of a religion diametrically opposite to that of the rest of the world, even as the Jews then, or christians afterwards.

Therefore I thought it fully worth while, to bestow some pains on these temples of theirs, as the only monuments we have left, of the patriarchal religion; and especially in regard to their extraordinary grandeur and magnificence, equal to any of the most noted wonders of the world, as commonly termed.

I have shewn largely enough, the evidences that there were such kinds of temples built all the world over, in the first times; but probably nothing of them now remaining, comparable to those in our own island: which therefore we ought to seek to rescue from oblivion, before it be too late.

I propose to publish but one volume more to complete this argument, as far as I have materials for that purpose. What I have done, I look upon as very imperfect, and but as opening the scene of this very noble subject. The curious will find sufficient room to extend it, to correct and adorn the plan I have begun. And I take it to be well worthy of the pains; as it lets in upon us an excellent view of the scheme of providence, in conducting the affair of true religion, thro’ the several ages of the world. We may hence discern the great purpose of inducing the Mosaick dispensation, on that very spot of ground where the main of idolatry began, and from whence it was propagated over all the western and politer world; and over which world providence rais’d the mighty Roman empire, to pave the way of a republication of the patriarchal religion.

We may make this general reflexion from the present work, that the true religion has chiefly since the repeopling mankind after the flood, subsisted in our island: and here we made the best reformation from the universal pollution of christianity, popery. Here God’s ancient people the Jews are in the easiest situation, any where upon earth; and from hence most likely to meet with that conversion designed them. And could we but reform from the abominable publick profanation of the sabbath and common swearing, we might hope for what many learned men have thought; that here was to be open’d the glory of Christ’s kingdom on earth.

I have render’d it sufficiently clear, that the Apollo of the ancients was really Phut son of Cham. And I have pointed to the reader, how he may have a perfect idea of the countenance of the man, in innumerable monuments of antiquity, now to be seen. I have pursued that amusing topick thro’ very many of the ancient patriarchs before and after Phut: so as to recover their, at least heroical, effigies. Which, I hope, sometime I may find an opportunity of publishing.

I shall conclude my preface with a piece of old poetry, being some nervous lines, in no contemptible vein, wrote on our subject a hundred years ago, by Samuel Danyel a domestick of queen Anne’s, wife to king James I. The curious reader will observe a remarkable delicacy in the sentiments throughout: a struggle between time and the greatness of these works, equal to that of letters, in endeavouring to recover and preserve the memory of them; which their founders, tho’ well qualified, neglected to do.

O Blessed letters, that combine in one

All ages past; and make one live with all!

Make us confer with those who now are gone,

And the dead living unto counsel call!

By you th’ unborn shall have communion

Of what we feel, and what does us befall.

Soul of the world, knowledge, without thee

What hath the earth that truly glorious is?

Why should our pride make such a stir to be;

To be forgot? What good is like to this,

To do worthy the writing, and to write

Worthy the reading, and the world’s delight!

You mighty lords, that with respected grace,

Do at the stern of fair example stand;

And all the body of this populace,

Guide with the only turning of your hand:

Keep a right course, bear up from all disgrace,

Observe the point of glory to our land.

Hold up disgraced knowledge from the ground,

Keep virtue in request, give worth her due.

Let not neglect with barbarous means confound

So fair a good, to bring in night anew.

Be not, oh be not accessary found

Unto her death, that must give life to you.

Where will you have your virtuous names safe laid?

In gorgeous tombs, in sacred cells secure?

Do you not see, those prostrate heaps betrayed

Your fathers bones, and could not keep them sure?

And will you trust deceitful stones fair laid,

And think they will be to your honour truer?

No, no, unsparing time will proudly send

A warrant unto wreck, that with one frown

Will all these mockeries of vain-glory rend,

And make them as before, ungrac’d, unknown.

Poor idle honours that can ill defend

Your memories that cannot keep their own!

And whereto serves that wondrous trophy now,

That on the goodly plain near Wilton stands?

That huge dumb heap, that cannot tell us how,

Nor what, nor whence it is, nor with whose hands,

Nor for whose glory it was set to show,

How much our pride mocks that of other lands.

Whereon when as the gazing passenger

Hath greedy look’d with admiration,

And fain would know its birth, and what it were,

How there erected, and how long agone;

Inquires and asks his fellow-traveller,

What he hath heard, and his opinion!

And he knows nothing; then he turns again,

And looks and sighs, and then admires afresh,

And in himself with sorrow doth complain,

The misery of dark forgetfulness.

Angry with time, that nothing should remain,

Our greatest wonders wonder to express.

Then ignorance, with fabulous discourse,

Robbing fair art and cunning of their right,

Tells how those stones were by the devil’s force,

From Africk brought, to Ireland in a night:

And thence to Britannie, by magick course,

From giants hand redeem’d by Merlin’s sleight.

And then near Ambry plac’d, in memory

Of all those noble Britons murder’d there,

By Hengist and his Saxon treachery,

Coming to parle in peace at unaware.

With this old legend then, credulity

Holds her content, and closes up her care.

And as for thee, thou huge and mighty frame,

That stands corrupted so by times despite,

And gives no evidence to save their fame,

That set thee there, and testify their right:

And art become a traitor to their name,

That trusted thee with all the best they might.

Thou shall stand, still belyed and slandered,

The only gazing stock of ignorance,

And by thy guilt the wise admonished,

Shall never more desire such heaps t’ advance,

Nor trust their living glory with the dead,

That cannot speak, but leave their fame to chance.

Tho’ time with all his power of years, hath laid

Long battery, back’d with undermining age,

Yet thou makes head, only with thy own aid,

And war with his all conquering forces wage;

Pleading the heavens prescription to be free,

And have a grant t’ indure as long as he.

ABURY,
A TEMPLE of the
British DRUIDS,
With some Others, Described.

CHAP. I.

Of the origin of Druid or patriarchal temples, with publick religion and celebration of the sabbath. They were made of rude stones set upright in the ground, round in form, and open. In hot countries, groves were planted about them. Abraham practised it, and from him our Druids. Of the quality of evidence, in matters of such antiquity. The patriarchs had a knowledge of the nature of the Deity to be ador’d, subsisting in distinct personalities: which is even deducible from human reason. The Druids had the same knowledge, as appears by their works. The first publick practice of religion was called, invoking in the name of Jehovah, the mediator.

THE writers on antiquities generally find more difficulty, in so handling the matter, as to render it agreeable to the reader, than in most other subjects. Tediousness in any thing is a fault, more so in this than other sciences. ’Tis an offence, if either we spend much time in a too minute description of things, or enter upon formal and argumentative proofs, more than the nature of such accounts will well bear. Nevertheless the dignity of the knowledge of antiquities, will always insure a sufficient regard for this very considerable branch of learning, as long as there is any taste or learning left in the world. And indeed we may in short ask, what is all learning, but the knowledge of antiquities? a recalling before us the acquirements in wisdom, and the deeds of former times. But the way of writing well upon them, as I conceive, is so to lay the things together, to put them in such attitude, such a light, as gains upon the affection and faith of the reader, in proceeding; without a childish pointing out every particular, without a syllogistical proving, or mathematical demonstration of them: which are not to be sought for in the case. The subject of antiquities must be drawn out with such strong lines of verisimilitude, and represented in so lively colours, that the reader in effect sees them, as in their first ages: And either brings them down to modern times, or raises himself, in the scale of time, as if he lived when they were made. Then we may truly say with the poet,

Scilicet antiquis proficiscitur inde venustas,

Quod, tanquam nova sint, qui legit illa, legat.

In endeavouring to keep up to such a rule, I must advertise the reader of the general purport of this volume. It may be said to consist of four parts. Three are descriptions of the three kinds of Druid temples, or we may call them patriarchal temples, which I have observed in Britain. The fourth will be reflexions upon them, as to their antiquity and origin; the founders of such in the more early ages of the world, and in the more oriental countries. And tho’ in writing the descriptive part of these heads, (which I did on the spot, and with great leisure) my papers swell’d to an enormous bulk; and it was necessary for my own right understanding the antiquities: yet I shall shorten them exceedingly, in delivering the work to the publick. In doing this, I shall be very much helped by the engraven designs which at one view give the reader a better notion of the things, than the most elaborate descriptions. Likewise in that part of the work wherein I reason upon these temples, and trace out the vestiges of such as are recorded to us by the learned authors of antiquity now preserved, I shall barely lay the appearances of things together; the relation between these monuments we now see with our eyes, and the accounts of such-like (as I take them) which I find in those authors to have been from oldest time. I shall leave the reader to form his judgment from such evidence, without endeavouring to force his assent with fancied proofs, which will scarce hold good, in matters of so remote an age.

After what I have said in my former volume on STONEHENGE, which carries our ideas concerning these antiquities, up to the very earliest times of the world; I may venture to discourse a little ex priori, concerning the origin of temples in general. And this will open my purpose concerning the three first heads of this book: the three different kinds of the Druid or patriarchal temples in the Britannic isles. If we desire to know any thing of a matter so very remote, as in all other affairs of antiquity, we must necessarily have recourse to the Bible. And I apprehend, it is mentioned in that passage Genesis IV. the last verse; “and to Seth, to him also there was born a son, and he call’d his name Enos: then began men to call upon the NAME of the LORD.”

I observe on this passage, the gloss in our English Bibles is thus, to call themselves by the name of the LORD, which is very erroneous: themselves is a mere interpolation; and would we translate it truly, it ought to be, to call in the name of Jehovah; rather, to invoke in the name of Jehovah. Vatablus turns it, then began the name of Jehovah to be invoked. The jewish writers generally take this passage to mean the origin of idolatry, as if it imported, then began men to profane the Name, by calling themselves therewith. And our great Selden drops into that opinion. But was it probable, the divine historian would have been so careful to commemorate an epoch so disagreeable? or to what purpose, even before he had so much as mention’d any publick form of true religion? the very wording of that verse imports somewhat very remarkable, which he was going to declare, “and to Seth, to him also there was born a son, and he called his name Enos: then began men to invoke in the name of Jehovah.”

TAB. II.
P. 2.

In understanding this verse aright, we must certainly affirm that Moses intended hereby, to assert the practice of publick religion; which necessarily includes two things, the origin of temples, and the sabbatical observance. For in all publick actions, time and place are equally necessary. In the generation, or days of Enos, grandson of Adam, when mankind were multiply’d into distinct families; besides private and family devotion, the publick worship of God was introduc’d in places set apart for that purpose, and on sabbath days. Publick worship necessarily implies all this.

Many and great authorities confirm this understanding of the words, as well as the reason of things. The Targum of Onkelos, Aquila’s translation. Rabbi Elieser in Maase Bereschit XXII. R. Salomon Jarchi, the Chaldee paraphrast. Vossius in comm. on Maimonides de idololatria. And very many more, too tedious to be recited.

Try the place by other like expressions in scripture, and we find, it amounts to the same thing. Genes. xii. 8. Abram builded an altar unto Jehovah, and invoked in the name of Jehovah. So it ought to be translated. This was the second altar he built in Canaan, being the second place he settled at, near Bethel. In the preceding verse, we have an account of his first settling at Sichem, and of Jehovah appearing to him personally and conversing with him: and of his building an altar to that Jehovah, who appeared unto him. But I think there is so little difficulty in it, that ’tis needless to multiply authorities or argumentations: yet the importance of it demanded thus much.

Here three things most evidently appear, 1. Jehovah was that person in the deity, who appeared visibly and discoursed with the patriarchs, not the invisible supreme. 2. That Abram erected an altar to this divine person Jehovah, worshipped him, and invoked in his name. Invoked whom? the supreme unquestionably, i. e. prayed to the supreme Being, in the name, virtue, effect, and merit of Jehovah, the mediatorial deity. The word NAME, in these passages of scripture, means the mediatorial deity, JEHOVAH by name: Ὁ Θεος Επιφανης, the God who appear’d personally to the patriarchs, who was the king of the Mosaic dispensation, and of the Jewish people, call’d the anointed or Messiah, 1 Sam. ii. 10, 35. he was the captain of the Israelites, that conducted them from Egypt to Canaan, Exod. xxiii. 20. the royal angel, the king, emperor. The angel of his face or presence, Isaiah lxiii. 9. the angel of the covenant, Malachi iii. 1. Melech Jehovah the angelick king, Zechar. iii. 1, 2, 3, 4. he is very God: for, says the supreme, in the before quoted passage in Exodus, behold I send an angel before thee (the angel, it ought to be read) to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. Beware of him and obey his voice, provoke him not, for he will not pardon your transgressions; for my NAME is in him. This same way of speaking Joshua uses, Josh. xxiv. 19. Ye cannot serve Jehovah; for he is a holy deity, he is a jealous God, he will not forgive your transgressions, nor your sins. The Jews confess this doctrine to be just. Rabbi Hadersan upon that passage in Zephaniah iii. 9. to call upon the NAME of Jehovah, says, this Jehovah is no other than Messiah. All this shews the patriarchs had a knowledge of the true nature of the deity, and that the Christian or mediatorial religion is the first and the last. And when men were quite deviated from the first, the Mosaic dispensation was but an intervening vail upon the effulgence and spirituality of true religion for a time, to reduce them to it, in the actual advent of the Messiah. 3. These altars, as they are here called, were the patriarchal temples like those of our druids, the places of publick worship; and invoking in the name of Jehovah, is a form of speech importing publick worship on sabbath days: equivalent to our saying, to go to church on sundays. Whence Servius on the Æneid III. v. 85. writes, in the most ancient manner of worshipping, they only pray’d directly to the deity, without offering sacrifice. And thus I apprehend, we are to understand Herodotus II. where he says the Athenians learn’d invoking, of the Pelasgi, who were Phœnicians: and probably they had it from Abraham, who was introduc’d into the land of Canaan, as a reformer of religion. Invoking was the ordinary method of devotion on sabbath days: sacrificing was extraordinary.

It was Abraham’s custom, wherever he dwelt, to build one of these temples: as afterward, in the plain of Mamre, by Hebron, Gen. xiii. 18. And at Beersheba we are told he planted a grove, and there invoked in the name of Jehovah, the everlasting God, Gen. xxi. 33. It cannot be doubted but there was an altar and work of stones at the same place. And this was the usage of all the patriarchs, his successors, ever after; as is obvious in scripture, even to Moses’s time. Isaac builded an altar in Beersheba, and invoked in the Name of Jehovah, who personally appear’d to him, Gen. xxvi. 25. Jacob set up the anointed pillar at Bethel, xxviii. 18. and the temple there, xxxv. At Shechem he builded another, xxxiii. 20. At Bethel he set up a pillar, where Jehovah personally appeared to him, and blessed him: he anointed it, and poured a drink-offering, or libation thereon, xxxv. 14. In Exod. xxiv. 4. we read, Moses rose early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, which we have no reason to doubt were set in a circle. The like was done after they were seated in the land of Canaan, till the temple of Solomon was built: for Samuel, when he dwelt at Ramah, built an altar, to Jehovah there, whereat to celebrate publick offices of religion, 1 Sam. vii. 17.

Hence we gather further these three things. 1. That they planted groves in patriarchal times, as temples for publick worship. It seems that this was done in those hot countries, for convenience in the summer-season: and perhaps for magnificence. For we are told, Abraham dwelt long at Beersheba, where he planted the grove. These were as our cathedrals; they were planted round about the circular parts of stones, as porticos for receiving of the congregation. Whence groves and temples became a synonymous appellation, both in sacred and heathen writers. 2. That these temples which they call’d altars, were circles of stones, inclosing that stone more properly nam’d the altar. The circles were greater or less, of more or fewer stones, as the will or convenience of the founder prompted. Moses his temple was a circle of twelve stones: and such we have in England. 3. They were commonly made on open plains, and rising grounds, conspicuous and commodious for multitudes, a whole neighbourhood to assemble in. This is the consequence of the nature and reason of the thing: for a matter of publick use must be in the most publick and conspicuous place. 4. The patriarchal religion, and the christian, is but one and the same. Hence in Isaiah xix. 19. the prophet speaking of the restitution of the patriarchal religion in Egypt, under the gospel dispensation, says, “In that day shall there be an altar to Jehovah in the midst of the land of Egypt; and a pillar, at the border thereof, to Jehovah.” This is expressly making use of the terms of a patriarchal temple, with a view to that religion restor’d, meaning the christian.

TAB. III.
P. 4.

View of the Temple of Rowldrich from the South.

Stukeley del.

A. the King Stone, as called. B. the Archdruids barrow. CC. round barrows: or King barrows.

These monuments of the piety of the patriarchs in the eastern parts of the world, were in time desecrated to idolatrous purposes, and at length destroy’d, even by the people of Israel, for that reason: and temples square in form and cover’d at top, were introduc’d at the Mosaic dispensation, in direct opposition to that idolatry. But before then, that first method pass’d all over the western world, and to Britain, where we see them to this day. By the way, we trace some footsteps of them, but there is always a fable annex’d; as generally at this day, in our Druid temples at home. Thus Pausanias in corinthiacis informs us, that near the river Chemarus, is a septum or circle of stones. He says, they have a report there, that this is the place whence Pluto carry’d away Proserpine. By such story we must understand, the mysteries were there celebrated. Pausanias writes, that the Thracians us’d to build their temples round, and open at top, in Bœotic. He speaks of such at Haliartus, by the name of Ναος, equivalent to the Hebrew Beth, which name Jacob gave to his temple. He speaks of several altars dedicate to Pluto, set in the middle of areas fenc’d in with stones: and they are call’d hermionenses. He tells us too, among the Orchomenians, is a most ancient temple of the Graces, but they worship ’em in the form of stones. From the number three, we may easily guess this was a Kist vaen, as our old Britons call it, or Kebla, like that in our great temple of Abury, and elsewhere. Indeed, the stones of these Kebla in time, instead of a direction in worship, became the object of worship; as Clemens Alexandrinus affirms.

That our Druids were so eminently celebrated for their use of groves, shews them to have a more particular relation to Abraham, and more immediately from him deriving the usage: by which way, I pointed at in good measure, in the account of STONEHENGE. Hence the name of Druid imports, priest of the groves; and their verdant cathedrals, as we may call them, are celebrated by all old writers that speak of this people. We all know the awful and solemn pleasure that strikes one upon entering a grove; a kind of religious dread arises from the gloomy majesty of the place, very favourable to the purpose intended by them. Servius upon Æneid III.

Ante urbem in luco falsi Simoëntis ad undam,

observes, Virgil never mentions a grove without a note of religion. Again, Æneid IX. ver. 4. Strabo says, the poets call temples by the name of groves. And this is frequently done in the scripture. But it is natural for our classic writers, when speaking of the Druids and their great attachment to religious rites, so different from what they were acquainted with, to insist much upon their groves; overlooking our monuments, which they would scarce dignify with the name of temples, because not covered like their own. Yet if with some, we would from hence conclude, that they were the only temples of the Druids, and therefore Stonehenge and the works we are upon, were none of theirs, we should err as much, as if we asserted Abraham only made use of groves, and not of the other temples erected on plains and open places.

Thus far I premis’d with brevity, as an introduction to our discourse, shewing the origin of temples among mankind; a necessary provision for that duty we owe to our sovereign author and benefactor. For unless we can prove ourselves self-sufficient and independent, all nature cries aloud for our acknowledgment of this duty. Private and domestic prayer is our duty as private persons and families, that we have life, and subsistence, and the common protection of providence: but the profession and exercise of publick religion is equally necessary as we are a community, a part of the publick, a parish, a city, a nation, link’d together by government, for our common safety and protection; in order to implore at the hands of God almighty the general blessings of life, wanting to us in that capacity. And that person who secludes himself from his share in this duty, is a rebel and traitor to the publick, and is virtually separated from the common blessings of heaven. But time is equally necessary to this publick duty as place, as every one’s reason must dictate. Therefore was the sabbath instituted; the very first command of our maker, even in the happy seat of Paradise, and before our fatal transgression. ’Tis the positive institution of God, and founded upon the strictest reason. So that if we allow the patriarchs to have built these temples, wherein to assemble for publick devotion, and disallow of the sabbath, because not particularly mention’d in the scripture that they did celebrate it, we think absurdly, and err against common sense and reason. The scriptures were given to teach us religion, but not to inform us of common sense and reason.

The duty of the sabbath commences as early as our being, and is included with great propriety in that observation of the divine historian concerning Adam’s grandson, Enos; when it pass’d from a family-ordinance to that of several families united, as then was the case. The particularity of the expression, invoking in the name of Jehovah, dictates to us the form of their religion, founded on the mediatorial scheme, which Mediator was a divine person, to be worshipped; and thro’ our faith and hope in him, or in his Name, we were to invoke God almighty for our pardon and protection. Therefore the same scheme of religion subsists, from the beginning to this day, the Mosaic system intervening chiefly as a remedy against idolatry, till the world was prepar’d for the great advent; and patriarchal religion should be republish’d under the name of christian.

From all this we must conclude, that the ancients knew somewhat of the mysterious nature of the deity, subsisting in distinct personalities, which is more fully reveal’d to us in the christian dispensation. All nature, our senses, common reason assures us of the one supreme and self-originated being. The second person in the deity is discoverable in almost every page of the old testament. After his advent, he informs us more fully of the nature of the third person: and that third person is discoverable in almost every page of the new testament. That the ancients had some knowledge of this great truth, the learned Steuchus Eugubinus demonstrates, in perenni philosoph. from their writings which are still left, such as Hermes, Orpheus, Hydaspes, Pythagoras, Plato, the Platonics, the sibylline verses, the oracles, and the like. Our Cudworth has very laudably pursued the same track, and Kircher, and our Ramsey in his history of Cyrus, and many more, to whom I refer the curious reader, who has a mind to be convinced of it. I shall only add this, that upon supposition only of an ancient tradition of it, having been handed down from one generation to another, in order to light up and kindle our reason concerning it; that ’tis a doctrine so far from being contrary to reason, or above human reason, that ’tis deducible therefrom, and perfectly agreeable to it, as I shall shew in [Chap. XV.]

Nor is this a slight matter; for if knowledge be a valuable thing, if it be the highest ornament and felicity to the human mind; the most divine part of all knowledge is to know somewhat of the nature of the deity. This knowledge the Druids assuredly attempted to come at, and obtained, as we gather from the different kinds of their temples; and when we have described them, we shall beg leave to resume this argument, and briefly to discourse on it again, as being the chief and ultimate purpose of all antique inquiries.

TAB. IV.
P. 6.

View of Rowldrich Stones from the West Sept. 11. 1724.

Stukeley del.

A. the Kistvaen at a Distance.

CHAP. II.

Of the origin of temples more particularly, the meaning of the name. The manner of them, round and open. The Mosaic tabernacle a temple square and cover’d, in opposition to the former desecrated into idolatry. Another reason, covered with skins, because typical of Messiah. So the patriarchal or Druid temples made in those forms, that were symbols of the deity, and the divine personalities thereof. When become idolatrous generally dedicated to the sun, by reason of their round form. The most ancient symbolic figure of the deity was the circle, snake and wings, which we see frequently on Egyptian and other Monuments. The patriarchal temples made in representations thereof; therefore of three kinds. I. A circle only. II. A circle and snake. III. A circle and wings. This Volume treats of a temple of each of these kinds in Britain. The temple of ROWLDRICH in Oxfordshire being of the first sort, described. The Evidence of its being a work of the Druids, drawn up in a kind of order, as a specimen. 1. Its high situation, on an open heath by the heads of rivers. 2. An open circle of stones set upright, taken from the surface of the ground. 3. The appearance of the weather on them. 4. From the name, the Gilgal of Joshua explain’d. 5. From the measure, the Druid cubit. 6. From the barrows all round it. A Druid’s court. The king’s tumulus. The archdruid’s tumulus, the founder. 7. From old reports concerning these works. 8. Sepulchres frequently the occasion of founding temples in all ages, from a hope of the body’s resurrection, and one occasion of deifying heroes, and introducing idolatry, the first species of it.

TEMPLE is a word deriv’d from the greek Τεμενος, a place cut off, inclosed, dedicated to sacred use, whether an area, a circle of stones, a field, or a grove. This matter, as all others, advanced from simplicity, by degrees, till it became what we now call a temple. Thus we read in Iliad II, of Ceres’s field. Iliad VIII, of Jupiter’s field and altar. In XXIII, another at the fountain of Sperchius. In Odyss. VIII, that of Venus Paphia. Pausanias mentions many of these. Cicero too among the Thebans, de nat. deor. III. In Odyss. XVII, a grove perfectly round by Ithaca. And these were encompass’d by a ditch which Pollux calls peribolus. Pausanias makes this particular remark in Achaic, of the grove of Diana servatrix. They were kept by priests who dwelt there for that purpose, as Maron in Odyss. IX.

Tempe signifies a grove or temple, which is the same thing. Strabo writes, that the poets, for ornament sake, call all temples groves. This was in affectation of antiquity.

Est nemus Æmoniæ, prærupta quod undique claudit

Sylva, vocant Tempe.——

Tempulum, or contractedly templum, is a lesser grove, or temple properly speaking, built with pillars, as it were in imitation of a great grove. The patriarchal temeni were call’d במיה excelsa, because generally made on high places. Hence the greek word βωμος. By the hebrew writers they were call’d sacella montana, mountain oratories. Sacellum, says Festus, is an open chapel, or without a roof. At length the word temple was apply’d to sacred structures built with a roof, in imitation of Solomon’s. And that was a durable and fixed one, an edifice of extraordinary grandeur and beauty, made in imitation of the Mosaic tabernacle, which was a temple itinerant, the first idea of a cover’d one, properly. There were two reasons, among others, why it was cover’d and square in form. 1. By way of opposition to the heathen ones, practised in all the countries round about, which were imitations of the first patriarchal temples there, and now were converted to idolatrous purposes. 2. Because it was a type of Messiah, or JEHOVAH who was to come in the flesh, therefore cover’d with skins. And that we may have the greatest authority in the case, our Saviour himself declares in the most publick manner, that the temple of Jerusalem was symbolical of his body, as we find it recorded in the gospel, John ii. 19. And the author of the Hebrews largely deduces the necessity of making temples to be the pictures of heavenly things, and particularly of the mediator, Heb. ix. 11, 23. which can be done no otherwise than symbolically. And authors that describe the tabernacle and temple, insist upon this largely. Nor is it otherwise with us christians, in our cathedrals, designing our saviour’s body extended on the cross. But in the more ancient patriarchal times, before the great advent, they form’d them upon the geometrical figures or pictures, or manner of writing, by which they express’d the deity, and the mystical nature thereof. And this same design of making temples in some kind of imitation of the deity, as well as they could conceive it, was from the very beginning. The heathen authors retain some notion of this matter, when they tell us, of temples being made in the form and nature of the gods. Porphyry in Eusebius pr. ev. III. 7. affirms the round figure to be dedicated to eternity, and that they anciently built temples round; but he did not understand the whole reason. And when they built temples properly, in imitation of the jewish, they made them often of a round form, and often open at top, to preserve as near as might be, the most ancient manner they had been acquainted with. Whence Pausanias writes, the Thracians us’d to build their temples round, and open at top.

Thus at Bethel, the place where Jacob built his temple, and where his grandfather Abraham had built one before, Jeroboam chose it for his idolatrous temple, call’d by the Alexandrian Greeks in after times, οικος Ων, the temple of On. S. Cyril in his comments on Hosea writes, that On is the sun, from its round form. The heathen had done all they could to corrupt the remembrance of the name of the true God, and turn’d Beth-el, which signifies the house of EL or God, to οικος Ων, the house of On, or the sun. As ηλιος, is a word undoubtedly made from EL, in the Hebrew, expressing God’s power and sovereignty; so much like Elion a name of God in Scripture, signifying Hypsistus, the most high. Gen. xiv. 18. Luke i. 37. in Arabic, allah taâla the most high God. Whence Atlas the name of consecration of the African hero, allah taâl.

TAB. V.
P. 8.

The prospect Northward from Rowldrich Stones.

Stukeley del.

A. the King Stone. B. the Archdruids barrow. C. king barrows or round barrows. D. long compton.

When these ancient patriarchal temples in other countries came to be perverted to idolatry, they consecrated many of them to the sun, thinking their round form ought to be referr’d to his disc; and that these pyramidal stones, set in a circle, imitated his rays. Hence call’d Aglibelus, rotundus Deus, as interpreted by Bochart. עגל בעל, ζευς επικυκλιος among the orientals, as Schedius observes. And had the ancient Greek writers seen our temples of Stonehenge, and the rest, they would have concluded them dedicated to the sun.

These temples of ours are always of a round form: and there are innumerable of them, all over the Britannic isles, nevertheless they are to be ranked into three kinds; for tho’ they are all circular, yet there are three manifest diversities which I have observ’d, regarding that threefold figure, by which the ancients, probably even from Adam’s time, express’d in writing, the great idea of the deity. This figure by Kircher is call’d ophio-cyclo-pterygo-morphus. ’Tis a circle with wings, and a snake proceeding from it. A figure excellently well design’d to picture out the intelligence they had, no doubt, by divine communication, of the mysterious nature of the deity. And it was the way of the ancients in their religious buildings, to copy out or analogize the form of the divine being, as they conceiv’d it, in a symbolical manner. By this means they produc’d a most effectual prophylact, as they thought, which could not fail of drawing down the blessings of divine providence upon that place and country, as it were, by sympathy and similitude.

I shall therefore make it the subject of the present volume, to describe one or two of each sort of the temples built upon the plan of these figures: wherein the founders have left an incontestible proof of that knowledge which the ancient world had of the divine nature, by these durable and magnificent monuments. The remainder of these temples (as many as are come to my knowledge) together with the places of the sports and games of the ancient Britons, and the religion of the Druids, I shall publish in the succeeding volume.

Names or words are necessary for the understanding of things; therefore 1. The round temples simply, I call temples; 2. Those with the form of a snake annext, as that of Abury, I call serpentine temples, or Dracontia, by which they were denominated of old; 3. Those with the form of wings annext, I call alate or winged temples. And these are all the kinds of Druid temples that I know of. We may call these figures, the symbols of the patriarchal religion, as the cross is of the christian. Therefore they built their temples according to those figures.

ROWLDRICH.

I shall begin with Rowlright or rather Rowldrich, and as a specimen of what requisites are sought for in these enquiries, I shall draw them up in a kind of order: which may be useful in all researches of this sort.

1. A situation on high ground, open heaths, by heads of rivers.

ROWLDRICH is a temple of the Druids of the first kind, a circular work which has been often taken notice of in print, lying in the north-west part of Oxfordshire: upon high ground, where the counties of Oxford, Warwick, and Glocester meet. ’Tis near the town of Chippin-Norton. Two rivers rise here, that run with quite contrary directions; the Evenlode towards the south part of the kingdom, which joining the Isis below Woodstock, visits the great luminary of Britain, Oxford, and then meets the Thames at Dorchester, the ancient Episcopal see of the Mercian kingdom. At this Dorchester are fine remains both of Saxon church antiquity, of Roman, and of British. The inquisitive that prefer our own country antiquities to the vain tour of foreign, will find much of curious amusement there. The other river Stour runs from Rowldrich directly north, to meet the Avon at Stratford, thence to the Severn sea. So that Rowldrich must needs stand on very high ground, and to those that attentively consider the place itself, it appears to be a large cop’d hill, on the summit of an open down; and the temple together with the Archdruid’s barrow hard by, stand on the very tip of it, having a descent every way thence: and an extensive prospect, especially into Glocestershire and Warwickshire. The country hereabouts was originally an open, barren heath; and underneath, a quarry of a kind of rag stone. At present near here are some inclosures, which have been plough’d up. The major part of our antiquity remains: tho’ many of the stones have been carried away within memory, to make bridges, houses, &c.

2. ’Tis an open temple of a circular form, made of stones set upright in the ground. The stones are rough and unhewn, and were (as I apprehend) taken from the surface of the ground. I saw stones lying in the field north of Norton, not far off, of good bulk, and the same kind as those of our antiquity. There are such in other places hereabouts, whence the Druids took them: tho’ in the main, carry’d off ever since, for building and other uses.

3. We observe the effect of the weather upon these works. This we are treating of, stands in a corner of the hedge of the inclosure, near the northern summit of the hill, “a great monument of antiquity,” says the excellent Mr. Camden, “a number of vastly great stones plac’d in a circular figure. They are of unequal height and shape, very much ragged, impair’d and decay’d by time.” Indeed as from hence we must form some judgment of their age, we may pronounce them not inferior to any in that respect; corroded like worm-eaten wood, by the harsh jaws of time, and that much more than Stonehenge, which is no mean argument of its being the work of the Druids.

4. We are led to this conclusion from the name. Mr. Camden calls them Rolle-rich stones. Dr. Holland in his note says, in a book in the Exchequer (perhaps he means doomsday book) the town adjacent, (whence its name) is Rollendrich, if it was wrote exactly, I suppose it would be Rholdrwyg, which means the Druids’ wheel or circle. Rhwyll likewise in the British, is cancelli, for these stones are set pretty near together, so as almost to become a continued wall, or cancellus. Further, the word Roilig in the old irish language, signifies a church; then it imports the Druids’ church, chancel, or temple, in the first acceptation of the word. We may call this place the Gilgal of Britain, to speak in the oriental manner, a word equivalent to the Celtic Rhol, a wheel or circle, which gave name to that famous camp or fortress where the host of Israel first pitch’d their tents in the land of Canaan; after they pass’d the river Jordan in a miraculous manner, dry-shod, as ’tis described in the sublimest manner, and equal to the dignity of the subject, in Joshua iv. There also we read, that Joshua caused twelve men, a man out of each tribe, to pitch twelve stones in the channel of the river Jordan, where the ark stood whilst the people pass’d over, when the stream was cut off; they were set there for a memorial. And they likewise took up twelve stones out of the bed of the river, and Joshua pitch’d them in Gilgal, in a circular form, which gave name to the place, meaning a rhowl or wheel. And to this he alludes in the next chapter, in that passage, which otherwise is difficult to be understood; for here Joshua circumcised the people, that rite having been omitted in the young race during their peregrination in the wilderness: “And the LORD said unto Joshua, this day have I rolled away the reproach of Egypt from off you; wherefore the name of the place is called Gilgal unto this day.”

TAB. VI.
P. 10.

View of the Kistvaen at Rowldrich from the East.

Stukeley del.

A. the Druid temple at a distance.

Commentators not apprehending this, run into many odd solutions, as not seeing a reason between name and thing. Some therefore suppose it so call’d, because from hence Joshua conquer’d all his enemies round about, and the like. But the truth is, Joshua set the stones in a circular form, like the ancient temples; but placed no altar there, because they had no need to use it as a temple, where the tabernacle was present, therefore call’d it simply the wheel. So I doubt not but the altar which Moses built under mount Sinai, with twelve pillars, was a circular work, as our Druid temples, Exod. xxiv. 4. The like we ought to think of the altar which Moses built, and called Jehovah Nissi, which the heathen perverted into Jupiter Nyseus, or Dionysus, Exod. xvii. 15. The like must be affirm’d of all the patriarchal altars of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. These works of ours prove it, which are but little later in time, and made in imitation of theirs; and without a pun, or false logic, these matters may be said to prove each other in a circle; where ’tis absurd to demand any positive proof thro’ extreme distance of times and places. I apprehend nothing further ought to be expected from us than to lay together circumstantial evidence, a concurrence of numerous and strong verisimilitudes; as is now the case with us concerning Rowldrich.

5. We very justly infer this is a temple of the Druids, from the measure it is built upon. In a letter from Mr. Roger Gale to me, dated from Worcester, Aug. 19, 1719, having been to visit this antiquity at my request, he tells me, the diameter of the circle is 35 yards. So the bishop of London writes, the distance at Stonehenge from the entrance of the area to the temple itself is 35 yards; so the diameter of Stonehenge is 35 yards. We suppose this is not measur’d with a mathematical exactness; but when we look into the comparative scale of English feet and cubits, we discern 60 cubits of the Druids is the measure sought for. The diameter of the outer circle of Stonehenge, and this circle at Rowldrich, are exactly equal.

I have repeated the table of the Druid cubits collated with our English feet, which will be of service to us throughout this work, [plate II.]

The circle itself is compos’d of stones of various shapes and dimensions, set pretty near together, as may best be seen by the drawings, Table [III], [IV.] They are flattish, about 16 inches thick. Originally there seems to have been 60 in number, at present there are 22 standing, few exceeding 4 foot in height; but one in the very north point much higher than the rest, 7 foot high, 5½ broad. There was an entrance to it from the north-east, as is the case at Stonehenge. Ralph Sheldon, esquire, dug in the middle of the circle at Rowldrich, but found nothing.

6. Another argument of its being a Druid temple, is taken from the barrows all around it, according to the constant practice in these places. To the north-east is a great tumulus or barrow of a long form, which I suppose to have been of an arch-druid. Between it and our temple is a huge stone standing upright, called the kingstone; the stone is 8 foot high, 7 broad, which, together with the barrow, may be seen in Tables [III], [V.] but the barrow has had much dug away from it. ’Tis now above 60 foot in length, 20 in breadth, flattish at top.

I know not whether there were more stones standing originally about this barrow, or that this belong’d to some part of the administration of religious offices in the temple, as a single stone.

In the same plate may be seen another barrow, but circular, below the road to the left hand, on the side of the hill. Under it is a spring-head running eastward to Long Compton. This barrow has had stone-work at the east end of it. Upon this same heath eastward, in the way to Banbury, are many barrows of different shapes, within sight of Rowldrich; particularly, near a place call’d Chapel on the heath, is a large, flat, and circular tumulus, ditch’d about, with a small tump in the center: this is what I call a Druid’s barrow; many such near Stonehenge, some whereof I opened; a small circular barrow a little way off it. There are on this heath too, many circular dish-like cavities, as near Stonehenge, we may call them barrows inverted.

Not far from the Druid’s barrow I saw a square work, such as I call Druids’ courts or houses. Such near Stonehenge and Abury. ’Tis a place 100 cubits square, double-ditch’d. The earth of the ditches is thrown inward between the ditches, so as to a raise a terrace, going quite round. The ditches are too inconsiderable to be made for defence. Within are seemingly remains of stone walls. ’Tis within sight of the temple, and has a fine prospect all around, being seated on the highest part of the ridge. A little further is a small round barrow, with stone-work at the east end, like that before spoken of near Rowldrich; a dry stone wall or fence running quite over it, across the heath.

Return we nearer to the temple, and we see 300 paces directly east from it in the same field, a remarkable monument much taken notice of; ’tis what the old Britons call a Kist vaen or stone chest; I mean the Welsh, the descendants of those invaders from the continent, Belgæ, Gauls and Cimbrians, who drove away the aboriginal inhabitants, that made the works we are treating of, still northward. Hence they gave them these names from appearances; as Rowldrich, the wheel or circle of the Druids; as Stonehenge they call’d choir gaur, the giants’ dance; as our saxon ancestors call’d it Stonehenge, the hanging-stones, or stone-gallows. Every succession of inhabitants being still further remov’d from a true notion and knowledge of the things.

Our Kist vaen is represented in plates [VI.] and [VII.] One shews the foreside, the other the backside; so that there needs but little description of it. ’Tis compos’d of six stones, one broader for the back-part, two and two narrower for the sides, set square to the former; and above all, as a cover, a still larger. The opening is full west, to the temple, or Rowldrich. It stands on a round tumulus, and has a fine prospect south-westward down the valley, where the head of the river Evenlode runs. I persuade myself this was merely monumental, erected over the grave of some great person there buried; most probably the king of the country, when this temple was built. And if there was any use of the building, it might possibly be some way accommodated to some anniversary commemoration of the deceased, by feasts, games, exercises, or the like, as we read in the classic poets, who describe customs ancienter than their own times. It is akin to that Kist vaen in Cornwall, which I have drawn in [plate XXXVII].

TAB. VII.
P. 12.

View of the Kistvaen of Rowldrich from the Southwest.

Stukeley del.

Vdr. Gucht. Sculp.

Near the arch-druid’s barrow, by that call’d the Kingstone, is a square plat, oblong, form’d on the turf. Hither, on a certain day of the year, the young men and maidens customarily meet, and make merry with cakes and ale. And this seems to be the remain of the very ancient festival here celebrated in memory of the interr’d, for whom the long barrow and temple were made. This was the sepulture of the arch-druid founder. At Enston, a little way off, between Neat Enston and Fulwell, by the side of a bank or tumulus, stands a great stone, with other smaller. ’Tis half a mile south-west of Enston church. A famous barrow at Lineham, by the banks of the Evenlode.

7. Mr. Camden writes further concerning our antiquity, that “the country people have a fond tradition, that they were once men, turn’d into stones. The highest of all, which lies out of the ring, they call the king. Five larger stones, which are at some distance from the circle, set close together, they pretend were knights, the ring were common soldiers.” This story the country people, for some miles round, are very fond of, and take it very ill if any one doubts of it; nay, they are in danger of being stoned for their unbelief. They have likewise rhymes and sayings relating thereto. Suchlike reports are to be met with in other like works, our Druid temples. They savour of the most ancient and heroic times. Like Perseus, turning men into stones; like Cadmus, producing men from serpents’ teeth; like Deucalion, by throwing stones over his head, and such like, which we shall have occasion to mention again, [chap. XIV.]

8. We may very reasonably affirm, that this temple was built here, on account of this long barrow. And very often in ancient times temples owe their foundation to sepulchres, as well as now. Clemens Alexandrinus in Protrept. and Eusebius, both allow it; and it is largely treated of in Schedius and other authors; ’tis a common thing among these works of our Druids, and an argument that this is a work of theirs. I shall only make two observations therefrom. 1. That it proceeded from a strong notion in antiquity of a future state, and that in respect of their bodies as well as souls; for the temples are thought prophylactic, and have a power of protecting and preserving the remains of the dead. 2. That it was the occasion of consecrating and idolizing of dead heroes, the first species of idolatry; for they by degrees advanc’d them into those deities of which these figures were symbols, whereof we shall meet with instances in the progress of this work.

Thus we pronounce Rowldrich a Druid temple, from a concurrence of all the appearances to be expected in the case; from its round form, situation on high ground, near springs, on an extended heath, from the stones taken from the surface of the ground, from the name, from the measure it is built on, from the wear of the weather, from the barrows of various kinds about it, from ancient reports, from its apparent conformity to those patriarchal temples mentioned in scripture. This is the demonstration to be expected in such antiquities. Nor shall I spend time in examining the notion of its belonging to Rollo the Dane, and the like. Mr. Camden had too much judgment to mention it. ’Tis confuted in the annotations to Britannia, and in Selden’s notes on Drayton’s Polyolbion, page 224. And let this suffice for what I can say upon this curious and ancient monument: the first kind, and most common of the Druid temples, a plain circle: of which there are innumerable all over the Britannick isles; being the original form of all temples, ’till the Mosaick tabernacle.

CHAP. III.

Abury, the most extraordinary work in the world, being a serpentine temple, or of the second kind, described. Now was the critical time of saving the memory of it. Account of the place. Natural history. The gray weathers, call’d Sarsens, a phœnician word, meaning a rock. Whence the name of the city of Tyre. Their weight and texture. The wear of the weather, more apparent here, than at Stonehenge, an argument of its being a much older work.

WHEN we contemplate the elegance of this country of Wiltshire, and the great works of antiquity therein, we may be persuaded, that the two atlantic islands, and the islands of the blessed, which Plato and other ancient writers mention, were those in reality of Britain and Ireland. They who first took possession of this country, thought it worthy of their care, and built those noble works therein, which have been the admiration of all ages. Stonehenge we have endeavoured to describe; and we are not more surpriz’d at the extraordinary magnitude of this work of Abury, than that it should have escap’d the observation of the curious: a place in the direct Bath-road from London. Passing from Marlborough hither, ’tis the common topic of amusement for travellers, to observe the gray weathers on Marlborough downs, which are the same kind of stones as this of our antiquity, lying dispers’d, on the surface of the ground, as nature originally laid them. When we come to this village, we see the largest of those stones in great numbers, set upright in the earth, in circles, in parallel lines and other regular figures, and a great part inclos’d in a vast circular ditch, of above 1000 foot diameter. And what will further excite one’s curiosity, the vallum or earth, which is of solid chalk, dug out of that ditch, thrown on the outside; quite contrary to the nature of castles and fortifications. The ditch alone, which is wide and deep, is a very great labour, and the rampart very high, and makes the appearance of a huge amphitheatre, for an innumerable company of spectators; but cannot possibly be design’d for offence or defence. This is twice passed by all the travellers: and its oddness would arrest one’s attention, if the stones escap’d it.

TAB. VIII.
P. 14.

A Scenographic view of the Druid temple of Abvry in north Wiltshire, as in its original.

W. Stukeley Delin.

Præhonorabili Dño. Dño. Philippo Dño. Hardwick, summo magnæ Brittanniæ Cancellario tabulam. L.M.D. W. Stukeley.

The mighty carcase of Stonehenge draws great numbers of people, out of their way every day, as to see a sight: and it has exercis’d the pens of the learned to account for it. But Abury a much greater work and more extensive design, by I know not what unkind fate, was altogether overlooked, and in the utmost danger of perishing, thro’ the humor of the country people, but of late taken up, of demolishing the stones. Mr. Camden the great light of British antiquities, took Kennet avenue to be plain rocks, and that the village of Rockley took its name from them. It is strange that two parallel lines of great stones, set at equal distance and intervals, for a mile together, should be taken for rocks in their natural site. As for the town of Rockley, ’tis four miles off, has nothing to do with this antiquity, tho’ probably had its name from the adjacent gray weathers, whence our stones were drawn.

Dr. Holland, his annotator, writes thus of it. “Within one mile of Selbury, (by which he means Silbury-hill) is Abury, an uplandish village, built in an old camp, as it seemeth, but of no large compass. It is environed with a fair trench, and hath four gates, in two of which stand huge stones, as jambs; but so rude, that they seem rather natural than artificial: of which sort, there are some other, in the said village.” In the time, when this was wrote, all the circles of these great stones, within the village of Abury, were nearly perfect; two of about 150 foot diameter, two of 300 foot diameter, and the great one of above 1000: which merited a higher notice. The largeness of the circles hinder’d an incurious spectator from discerning their purpose.

I persuade my self the intelligent reader, by casting his eye over the plate in the [frontispiece], being the village of Abury, will see enough to excite a vast idea of the place: more so, if they conceive that the two avenues of Kennet and Bekamton, going off at the bottom, to the right and the left, extend themselves each, above a mile from the town.

Dr. Childrey likewise, in his Britannia Baconica, takes these stones about Kennet to be mere rocks. Thus if our minds are not properly dispos’d for these inquiries, or we believe nothing great in art, preceded the times of the Romans, we may run into Munster’s error, in cosmograph. iii. 49. who believes, plain celtic urns dug up in Poland, to be the work of nature. Harrington in his notes on Orlando furioso speaks likewise of Abury.

Just before I visited this place, to endeavour at preserving the memory of it, the inhabitants were fallen into the custom of demolishing the stones, chiefly out of covetousness of the little area of ground, each stood on. First they dug great pits in the earth, and buried them. The expence of digging the grave, was more than 30 years purchase of the spot they possess’d, when standing. After this, they found out the knack of burning them; which has made most miserable havock of this famous temple. One Tom Robinson the Herostratus of Abury, is particularly eminent for this kind of execution, and he very much glories in it. The method is, to dig a pit by the side of the stone, till it falls down, then to burn many loads of straw under it. They draw lines of water along it when heated, and then with smart strokes of a great sledge hammer, its prodigious bulk is divided into many lesser parts. But this Atto de fe commonly costs thirty shillings in fire and labour, sometimes twice as much. They own too ’tis excessive hard work; for these stones are often 18 foot long, 13 broad, and 6 thick; that their weight crushes the stones in pieces, which they lay under them to make them lie hollow for burning; and for this purpose they raise them with timbers of 20 foot long, and more, by the help of twenty men; but often the timbers were rent in pieces.

They have sometimes us’d of these stones for building houses; but say, they may have them cheaper, in more manageable pieces, from the gray weathers. One of these stones will build an ordinary house; yet the stone being a kind of marble, or rather granite, is always moist and dewy in winter, which proves damp and unwholsom, and rots the furniture. The custom of thus destroying them is so late, that I could easily trace the obit of every stone; who did it, for what purpose, and when, and by what method, what house or wall was built out of it, and the like. Every year that I frequented this country, I found several of them wanting; but the places very apparent whence they were taken. So that I was well able, as then, to make a perfect ground-plot of the whole, and all its parts. This is now twenty years ago. ’Tis to be fear’d, that had it been deferr’d ’till this time, it would have been impossible. And this stupendous fabric, which for some thousands of years had brav’d the continual assaults of weather, and by the nature of it, when left to itself, like the pyramids of Egypt, would have lasted as long as the globe, must have fallen a sacrifice to the wretched ignorance and avarice of a little village unluckily plac’d within it; and the curiosity of the thing would have been irretrievable.

Such is the modern history of Abury, which I thought proper to premise, to prepare the mind of the reader. All this was done in my original memoirs, which I wrote on the spot, very largely. Tho’ it was necessary for me then to do it, in order to get a thorough intelligence of the work; yet I shall commit nothing more to the press, than what I judge absolutely necessary to illustrate it.

In regard to the natural history of the stones, ’tis the same as that of Stonehenge, which is compos’d of the very same stones, fetch’d from the same Marlborough-downs, where they lie on the surface of the ground in great plenty, of all dimensions. This was the occasion, why the Druids took the opportunity of building these immense works in this country. The people call these great stones, sarsens; and ’tis a proverb here, as hard as a sarsen; a mere phœnician word, continued here from the first times, signifying a rock. The very name of Tyre is hence derived, of which largely and learnedly Bochart, Canaan II. 10. This whole country, hereabouts, is a solid body of chalk, cover’d with a most delicate turf. As this chalky matter harden’d at creation, it spew’d out the most solid body of the stones, of greater specific gravity than itself; and assisted by the centrifuge power, owing to the rotation of the globe upon its axis, threw them upon its surface, where they now lie. This is my opinion concerning this appearance, which I often attentively consider’d. ’Tis worth while for a curious observer to go toward the northern end of that great ridge of hills overlooking Abury from the east, call’d the Hakpen, an oriental name too, that has continued to it from Druid times. A little to the right hand of the road coming from Marlborough to Abury, where are three pretty barrows, and another dish-like barrow, if we look downwards to the side of the hill toward Abury, we discern many long and straight ridges of natural stone, the same as the gray weathers, as it were emerging out of the chalky surface. They are often cross’d by others in straight lines, almost at right angles. For hereabouts, it seems, that the chalk contracting itself, and growing closer together, as it hardened, thrust the lapidescent matter into these fissures. ’Tis a very pretty appearance. This is near that part of the downs call’d Temple-downs. There are no quarries, properly speaking, nearer Abury than Swindon, and those have not long been dug. In Caln they dig up a paltry kind of stone, fit for nothing but mending the highways. But our gray weather stone is of so hard a texture, that Mr. Ayloff of Wooton-basset hewed one of them to make a rape-mill stone, and employ’d twenty yoke of oxen to carry it off. Yet so great was its weight, that it repeatedly broke all his tackle in pieces, and he was forc’d to leave it. It may be said of many one of our gray weathers,

Est moles nativa, loco res nomina fecit.

Appellant saxum, pars bona montis ea est. Ovid.

Lord Pembroke caus’d several of these stones to be dug under, and found them loose, and detach’d. My lord computed the general weight of our stones at above fifty tun, and that it required an hundred yoke of oxen to draw one. Dr. Stephen Hales makes the larger kind of them to be seventy tun. Mr. Edward Llwyd, in his account of the natural history of Wales, Phil. Trans. abridg’d, Vol. V. 2. p. 118. writes, he found a strange appearance of great stones, and loose fragments of rocks on the surface of the earth, not only on wide plains, but on the tops too of the highest mountains. So the moor stones on the wastes and hill-tops of Cornwall, Derbyshire, Devonshire, Yorkshire, and other places, of a harder nature than these, and much the same as the Egyptian granite.

TAB. IX.
P. 16.

The Roman road leading from Bekampton to Hedington July 18. 1723.

Stukeley del.

Vdr. Gucht. Sculp.

As to the internal texture of this stone, when broke, it looks whitish like marble. It would bear a pretty good polish, but for a large quantity of bluish granules of sand, which are soft, and give it a grayish or speckled colour, when smooth’d by an engine. It consists, as all other stones, of a mixture of divers substances, united by lapidescent juices, in a sufficient tract of time. Sometimes in one stone shall be two or three colours, sometimes bits of flints kneaded amongst the rest. In one stone fetch’d from Bekamton avenue, near Longstone barrow (as commonly call’d) and which was broken and made into a wall, at the little alehouse above Bekamton, in the Devizes road, I saw several bones, plainly animal, part of the composition of the stone. This I admir’d very much, and concluded it to be antediluvian. The stone in general is shining, close, and hard, little inferior to common marble; yet the effect which time and weather has had upon it, far beyond what is visible at Stonehenge, must necessarily make us conclude the work to be many hundred years older in date. In some places I could thrust my cane, a yard long, up to the handle, in holes and cavities worn through by age, which must needs bespeak some thousands of years continuance.

CHAP. IV.

The figure of the temple of Abury is a circle and snake. Hakpen, another oriental word still preserved here, meaning the serpent’s head. The chorography of Abury. A description of the great circle of stones 1400 foot in diameter. Of the ditch inclosing it. The vallum form’d on the outside, like an amphitheater to the place. This represents the circle in the hieroglyphic figure. Of the measures, all referring to the ancient eastern cubit which the Druids us’d.

THE situation of Abury is finely chose for the purpose it was destin’d to, being the more elevated part of a plain, from whence there is an almost imperceptible descent every way. But as the religious work in Abury, tho’ great in itself, is but a part of the whole, (the avenues stretching above a mile from it each way,) the situation of the intire design is likewise projected with great judgment, in a kind of large, separate plain, four or five miles in diameter. Into this you descend on all sides from higher ground. The country north of Abury, about Berwick-basset and Broad Hinton, is very high, tho’ not appearing so to be, and much above the level of Abury town. In a field of Broad Hinton the water runs two ways, into the Thames and Severn, and they pretend ’tis the highest ground in England. ’Tis indeed part of that very great ridge of hills, coming from Somersetshire, and going hence north-eastward, to the white-horse hill. So that the ground northward and westward, tho’ not much appearing so, is still very high, a cliff descending that way; and whilst guarded to the east by the Hakpen, yet it may be called like the thessalian, of the same name,

——Zephyris agitata Tempe. Hor.

The whole temple of Abury may be consider’d as a picture, and it really is so. Therefore the founders wisely contriv’d, that a spectator should have an advantageous prospect of it, as he approach’d within view. To give the reader at once a foreknowledge of this great and wonderful work, and the magnificence of the plan upon which it is built, I have design’d it scenographically in [Table VIII.] the eye being somewhat more elevated than on the neighbouring hill of Wansdike, which is its proper point of sight, being south from it.

When I frequented this place, as I did for some years together, to take an exact account of it, staying a fortnight at a time, I found out the entire work by degrees. The second time I was here, an avenue was a new amusement. The third year another. So that at length I discover’d the mystery of it, properly speaking; which was, that the whole figure represented a snake transmitted thro’ a circle; this is an hieroglyphic or symbol of highest note and antiquity.

In order to put this design in execution, the founders well studied their ground; and, to make their representation more natural, they artfully carry’d it over a variety of elevations and depressures, which, with the curvature of the avenues, produces sufficiently the desired effect. To make it still more elegant and picture-like, the head of the snake is carried up the southern promontory of the Hakpen hill, towards the village of West Kennet; nay, the very name of the hill is deriv’d from this circumstance, meaning the head of the snake; of which we may well say with Lucan, lib. IV.

Hinc ævi veteris custos, famosa vetustas

Miratrixque sui signavit nomine terras,

Sed majora dedit cognomina collibus istis.

Again, the tail of the snake is conducted to the descending valley below Bekamton.

TAB. X.
P. 18.

Stukeley d.

Prospect of the Roman Road & Wansdike Just above Calston May 20. 1724.
This demonstrates that Wansdike was made before the Roman Road.

Thus our antiquity divides itself into three great parts, which will be our rule in describing the work. The circle at Abury, the fore-part of the snake, leading towards Kennet, which I call Kennet-avenue; the hinder part of the snake, leading towards Bekamton, which I call Bekamton-avenue; for they may well be look’d on as avenues to the great temple at Abury, which part must be more eminently call’d the temple.

This town is wrote Aubury, Avebury, Avesbury, sometimes Albury: ’tis hard to say which is the true. The former three names may have their origin from the brook running by, au, aux, water, awy in welsh; the old german aha. The latter points to Aldbury, or old work, regarding its situation within the vallum. Nor is it worth while to dwell on its etymology; the saxon name is a thing of so low a date, in comparison of what we are writing upon, that we expect no great use from it; unless Albury has regard to al, hal, healle, gothicè

a temple or great building. There are two heads of the river Kennet rising near it: one from a little north-west of Abury, at Monkton, runs southward to Silbury-hill; this affords but little water, except in wet seasons. At Silbury-hill it joins the Swallow head, or true fountain of the Kennet, which the country people call by the old name, Cunnit; and it is not a little famous among them. This is a plentiful spring. It descends between east and west Kennet, by the temple on Overton-hill, which is properly the head of the snake: it passes by Overton, and so to Marlborough, the roman Cunetio, which has its name from the river.

To conduct the reader the better through this great work, I must remind him of what I wrote in the account of Stonehenge, p. 11, concerning the Druid cubit or measure, by which they erected all their structures, that ’tis 20 inches and four fifths of the english standard. For this purpose I have repeated the [plate] wherein the english foot and Druid cubit is compar’d to any lengths, which must necessarily accompany us in the description. A ready way of having the analogism between our feet and the cubits is this, 3 foot 5 inches and a half makes 2 cubits. A staff of 10 foot, 4 inches, and a little more than half an inch, becomes the measuring-reed of these ancient philosophers, being 6 cubits, when they laid out the ground-plot of these temples; where we now are to pursue the track of their footsteps which so many ages have pass’d over.

The whole of this temple, wherein the town of Abury is included I have laid down in [Table I], the frontispiece, done from innumerable mensurations, by which means I fully learn’d the scheme and purport of the founders. ’Tis comprehended within a circular ditch or trench above 1400 foot in diameter, which makes 800 cubits, being two stadia of the ancients. A radius of 400 cubits, one stadium, struck the inner periphery of the ditch, in the turf. This is done with a sufficient, tho’ not a mathematical exactness. They were not careful in this great measure, where preciseness would have no effect, seeing the whole circle cannot be taken in by the eye on the same level. The ditch is near 80 foot, which is 45 cubits broad, very deep, like the foss that encompasses an old castle. The great quantity of solid chalk dug out of it, is thrown on the outside, where it forms a mighty vallum, an amphitheatrical terrace, which hides the sight of the town as we come near it, and affords a good shelter from the winds. ’Tis of the same breadth at bottom as the ditch at top. The compass of this, on the outside, Mr. Roger Gale and I measured about 4800 feet, August 16, 1721.

The included area of the temple containing about 22 acres, I observ’d to have a gentle descent, from the meridian line of it to the east, and to the west: carrying the rain off both ways. The north point is the highest part of the whole. About 35 feet or 20 cubits within the verge of this circular ditch, is a great circle of great stones. The epithet may well be redoubled. These great masses are really astonishing, if we contemplate a single stone, and consider how it was brought hither, and set upright in the ground, where it has stood, I doubt not, 3 or 4 thousand years. But how is the wonder heightened, when we see the number one hundred, which composes this mighty circle of 1300 foot diameter! The stones of this circle, tho’ unhewn, are generally about 15, 16, or 17 foot high, and near as much in breadth. About 43 English feet, measures regularly from the center of one stone, to the center of the other. Look into the scale and we discern these measures of the height and breadth of the stones. 17 feet is ten cubits; 43 feet the central distance from stone to stone, is 25 cubits of the Druids; so that the interval between is 15 cubits. Tho’ this be the general and stated measure, which was proposed by the founders, where the stones suited, and of the largest dimensions, yet we must understand this, as in all their works, with some latitude. The ancients studied a certain greatness: to produce an effect, not by a servile exactness no way discernible in great works, but in securing the general beauty; especially we must affirm this of our Druids, who had to do with these unshapely masses, and where religion forbad them applying a tool. But the purpose they proposed, was to make the breadth of the stone to the interval, to be as two to three. They very wisely judg’d that in such materials, where the scantlings could not be exact, the proportions must still be adjusted agreeable to their diversities, and this both in respect of the particulars, and of the general distance to be filled up. These stones were all fetched from the surface of the downs. They took the most shapely, and of largest dimensions first; but when ’twas necessary to make use of lesser stones, they set them closer together, and so proportion’d the solid and the vacuity, as gave symmetry in appearance, and a regularity to the whole.

Therefore tho’ 25 cubits be the common measure of the interval between center and center of the largest stones of this circle, yet this is not always the rule; for if we measure the two stones west of the north entrance (which entrance was made for the convenience of the town, by throwing the earth of the vallum into it again) you will find it to be about 27 feet. This is but 16 of the Druid cubits, and here us’d, because these stones are but of moderate bulk. The next intervals are 43 feet as usual, being of the larger kind of stones, so plac’d 25 cubits central distance, and then they proceed. This is in that call’d pasture IIII. in the ground plot.

I have always been at first in some perplexity in measuring and adjusting these works of the Druids, and they seem’d magical, ’till I became master of their purpose. Therefore to make it very plain to the reader, I shall repeat what I have deliver’d in other words, concerning this great circle, which is a general rule for all others.

TAB. XI.
P. 20.

Rundway hill 18 Iuly, 1723.

Stukeley del.

A. Bekhampton. B. the Model of a Camp. C. Celtic barrows. D. the way to Verlucio.

As to the construction of this circle, by diligent observation, I found this to be the art of the Druids. ’Tis not to be thought, they would be at the trouble of bringing so many mountains together, of placing them in a regular form, without seeking how to produce the best effect therein, and thus they obtain’d their purpose. As it was necessary, the stones should be rude and native, untouch’d of tool, and that it was impossible to procure them of the dimensions exactly; they consider’d that the beauty in their appearance must be owing to their conformity, as near as may be, and to the proportion between the solid and the void interval. This ratio with judgment they chose to be as two to three: two parts the breadth of the stone, the interval three. And this they accommodated to the whole circle. So that they first brought 100 of their choicest stones together, and laid them in the destin’d circle, at the intended distances, according to that proportion: and then raised them into their respective places.

Hence I find, that where the stones are 15, 16, or 17 feet high above ground, and as much broad, as for the most part they are, about 43 English feet measures, from the center of one stone to the center of another; there the square of the solid or stone is ten cubits, the void or interval is 15: the whole central distance 25. Therefore the proportion of the solid to the void is as two to three.

But before I found out this key to the work, I met with a good deal of difficulty, because the central intervals and the voids were different, for they proportion’d these to the breadths of the stones, as above. Still they chose whole numbers of cubits for that proportion; for instance, in the stones at the northern and modern entrance, where they are but of a moderate bulk, you measure but about 27 feet central distance. This is 16 cubits.

Further I observ’d, they took care to make a reasonable gradation, between greater and lesser stones, not to set a great stone and a little one near one another, but make a gradual declension; by this means in the whole, the eye finds no difference. The proportion of solid and void being the same, the whole circle appears similar and altogether pleasing.

I thought it adviseable to give a [plate] of a very small part of this magnificent circle, being 3 stones now standing in situ. ’Tis a most august sight, and whence we may learn somewhat of the appearance of the whole.

I observ’d further, that as these stones generally have a rough and a smoother side; they took care to place the most sightly side of the stone inwards, toward the included area. For this vast circle of stones is to be understood, as the portico inclosing the temple properly. Between this circle and the ditch is an esplanade or circular walk quite round, which was extraordinary pretty when in its perfection. It was originally 25 cubits broad, equal to the central distances of the stones. The quickset hedges now on the place, sometimes take the range of the stones, sometimes are set on the verge of the ditch. Further I observ’d they set the largest and handsomest stones in the more conspicuous part of the temple, which is that southward, and about the two entrances of the avenues.

Out of this noble circle of stones 100 in number, there was left in the year 1722, when I began to write, above 40 still visible: whereof 17 were standing, 27 thrown down or reclining. Ten of the remainder all contiguous, were at once destroy’d by Tom Robinson, anno 1700, and their places perfectly levelled, for the sake of the pasturage. In the north entrance of the town one of the stones, of a most enormous bulk, fell down, and broke in the fall.

——nec ipso

monte minor procumbit.—— Virg.

It measured full 22 feet long. Reuben Horsall, clerk of the parish, a sensible man and lover of antiquity, remembers it standing. And when my late lord Winchelsea (Heneage) was here with me, we saw three wooden wedges driven into it, in order to break it in pieces.

In the great [frontispiece plate], I have noted many dates of years, when such and such stones were demolished, and took down the particulars of all: some are still left buried in the pastures, some in gardens. I was apt to leave this wish behind;

Pro molli viola, pro purpureo narcisso

Carduus, & spinis surgat paliurus acutis! Virg.

The seat of many is visible by the remaining hollow; of others by a hill above the interr’d. Of many then lately carry’d off the places were notorious, by nettles and weeds growing up, and no doubt many are gone since I left the place. But the ground-plot representing the true state of the town and temple, when I frequented it, I spare the reader’s patience in being too particular about it.

When this mighty colonnade of 100 of these stones was in perfection, there must have been a most agreeable circular walk, between them and the ditch; and it’s scarce possible for us to form a notion of the grand and beautiful appearance it must then have made.

TAB. XII.
P. 22.

A peice of the great circle, or
A View at the South Entrance into the temple at Abury Aug. 1722.