Читать книгу History of Brighthelmston; or, Brighton as I View it and Others Knew It - John Ackerson Erredge - Страница 4

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Although there is no doubt that the vicinity of Brighton at a very remote period was occupied as a Roman military station, it is not the intention of the compiler of this work to date, merely on supposition, the origin of the town, coeval as it might have been with the landing of Julius Cæsar in Britain. The “Magna Britannia,” published in 1737, mentions:—“As to the antiquity of this town, there is reason to believe it to have stood a vast tract of time. From the accounts our historians give of it, for some of them speak of it ever since Julius Cæsar’s arrival in Britain, and affirm, that this was the place where he landed his legions; (August 26th, 55 B.C., [1]) but since others assert his landing to have been at Hastings, we shall not be very positive, yet may justly insist upon it as most probable, because there is good anchorage in the bay here; and besides, there appears on the west side of this town to this day, for near a mile together, vast numbers of men’s bones, and some of them of prodigious size, which plainly proves that there has been some warlike engagement near it.” As an illustration that what has been transmitted to us orally, especially of remote periods, cannot be relied on, there is told the following tale of “Cæsar’s Stile”:—Dr. Stukely, or some other antiquarian, was travelling through England, when he heard that on a certain hill there was a stile called Cæsar’s Stile. “Ay,” said the doctor, “such a road, mentioned in Antoninus, passed near here; and the traditional name confirms the possibility of a Roman camp on this spot.” Whilst he was surveying the prospect, a peasant came up, whom the doctor addressed thus—“They call this Cæsar’s Stile, my friend, do they not?” “Ees, zur,” said the man, “they calls it so arter poor old Bob Cæsar, the carpenter; rest his soul; I holped him to make it, when I was a boy.”

The “Burrell MSS.” state that:—“There are three Roman castra, or camps, lying in a line over-thwart the Downs from Brighthelmstone to Ditchelling, from south to north. The first, a large one, called the Castle, about a mile from Brighton, eastward, and a mile from the sea, on the summit of a lofty hill commanding the sea-coast; the next, a smaller, called Hollingbury Castle, nearly about the middle of the Downs, also commanding from a lofty hill, by Stanmer, the whole western sea-coast of Sussex; and a third, a large one, called Ditchelling Castle, containing between twelve and fourteen acres, is the highest point of the Downs thereabouts, and commands part of the sea-coast, and all the northern edge of the Downs, and the wild underneath it.” A military Roman way was discovered a few years ago, on St. John’s Common, and in the enclosed lands adjoining, in the parishes of Keymer and Clayton, fully confirming the opinion of Camden and Stillingfleet that the Portus Adurni of the Romans was at Aldrington. [2] On the west side also of Glynd Bridge, near Lewes, a paved Roman causeway was discovered, lying three feet beneath the turf, upon a bed of silt, or blue clay, twenty feet thick; and near it was found a large brass coin of Antoninus Pius.

By whatever name Brighton was then known, there is no doubt it was a place of some note in the time of the Romans, as it was peculiarly favourable to all the purposes of the fisher and the hunter. Romish coins are still frequently found in its vicinity, and in the year 1750, near the town, an urn was dug up, which contained a thousand denarii of different impresses from Antoninus Pius to the Emperor Philip; and since that time there have been found in some of the burghs or barrows to the east of the town, ashes and fragments of human bones, enclosed in urns of Roman manufacture. In preparing the ground for enclosing of the Old Stein, in 1818, several Roman coins were turned up by the workmen, on one of which, round the impression of the head, was the inscription, “IMP. ALEXANDER PIUS, A. V. C,” and on the reverse, “MARS ULTOR,” with the initials S. C. between the figure of Mars. The date, however, was illegible. In forming the Race Course to the south of the Stand,—since restored to its original state,—several urns of Roman fabrication were dug up; and since then, to the east of the town, ashes and fragments of human bones have been found enclosed in Roman urns.

Relicts of the ancient Britons, before the time of the Romans in Britain, have at various times been found in the vicinity of Brighton. The most perfect were those discovered in a Barrow in Coney-burrow field, Hove, in January, 1856. In this field was a mound about 20 feet high, situated north of the pathway from Brighton to Hove, about N.N.E. of the church of St. John the Baptist. Some 40 years since, this hillock was covered with furze, and was a burrow for rabbits; but at a more recent date, when the habitations of men became erected contiguous, and the human family extended thither, the colony of rabbits dispersed, and their abode became the rendezvous of rustic games. Our highly respected local antiquarian, Barclay Phillips, Esq., thus describes it, and the incidents connected with it:—

“Rising from a perfectly level plain, and being unconnected with any other hills, it always presented the appearance of an artificial mound, and therefore, when, some years ago, a road was cut through it to the Hove Station of the Brighton and Portsmouth Railway, I was anxious to learn whether any antiquities had been met with; but not any were then found. Now, however, all doubt on the subject has been set at rest, and the hillock proved to be a Barrow, or monumental mound erected over the remains of an ancient British chieftain. Labourers have recently been employed removing the earth of this hill, and last week, on reaching the centre of the mound, about two yards west of the road leading to Hove Station, and about nine feet below the surface, dug out a rude coffin between six and seven feet long. On exposure to the atmosphere the boards immediately crumbled away; but a few of the knots remained, and prove to be of oak. The coffin contained small fragments of bone, some of which I have seen, and the following curious relics:—

“1. An Amber Cup, with a handle on one side. It is hemispherical in shape, rather deep, with a lip turning outwards, and is ornamented merely with a band of fine lines running round the outside about half an inch from the top. From the fact of the rim not being perfectly round, and the band before-mentioned not passing over the space within the handle, and its being marked off at each end with a line seemingly cut across, we may conjecture it to have been made and carved by hand.

“2. Head of a Battle Axe, about five inches long. It is in perfect preservation, and made of some sort of iron-stone, the wooden handle, having of course, long since decayed.

“3. A small Whetstone, with a hole neatly drilled through one end, so that it might be suspended by a thong to the person, and carried about.

“4. A Bronze Spear Head, very much oxidised, and so brittle that it broke into halves as it was being taken out of the ground. Two of the rivets and fragments of the spear handle still remain attached to the lower end of the blade.

“The workmen described the coffin as resting on the natural soil, which is stiff yellow clay, while the mound itself bears every appearance of having been formed of surface earth and rubbish thrown up together. I minutely examined the sections of the hill, and myself picked out several specimens of charred wood, and was informed that such fragments were very abundant.

“The manner of sepulture and all the relics, excepting the spear head, indicate this mound as having been the burial-place of a British chieftain before the time of the Roman invasion;—the spear-head certainly more nearly, though not exactly, resembles those used afterwards. The mound was of the simplest and most ancient form, and therefore I am inclined to think we may reckon it as at least 2000 years old, perhaps more! It has now disappeared. The last clod of that earth which so long covered the bones of a British chieftain was this afternoon carted away; and coffin, bones, and earth have been thrown pell-mell to form the mould of the future rosary of Palmyra square.”

At a meeting of the Archæological Society in London, about a month after the opening of this barrow, the cup, &c., were exhibited; when Mr. Kemble and other celebrated antiquaries gave their opinion thus:—“The cup is the only known specimen of so large a size, and the battle axe is superior to any similar object in the British Museum.” Mr. Hawkins and Mr. Franks, who have the care of the antiquarian departments, both declared the “find” in this barrow to have been the richest ever known. These rare specimens of local antiquity, through the kindness of Sir Francis Goldsmid, of “The Wick,” on whose land they were found, form a prominent feature of the Brighton Museum, at the Royal Pavilion.