THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB. 287
Some of the members assembled at Saffron Walden on the Friday, and the main
body travelled down on the Saturday by the Cambridge express train, which was
specially stopped at Audley End at about 10.30 a.m. Conveyances were in wait-
ing, and the party was driven by the side of Lord Braybrooke's beautiful park to
Saffron Walden Common, where the curious Maze was inspected under Mr. Joseph
Clarke's direction (see Mr. Maynard's paper in the present volume).
A very pleasant drive was then taken to Ashdon ; the day was beautifully fine,
and the country traversed afforded charming landscapes of hill and dale. At
Ashdon the party was met by the Rector, the Rev. H. B. Swete, D.D., who led
the way to the National School Room, where were exhibited the Registers, dating
back to 1553, large scale maps of the district, and several antiquities found near
Ashdon. Dr. Swete gave an address upon the history of his parish, which he
claimed to be "Assanduna" of the Chroniclers, and the site of the battle between
Eadmund and Cnut, A.D. 1016.5 Other archaeologists, with much reason, assign
to Hockley or Ashingdon (near which is an encampment and barrows) in Roch-
ford Hundred, the remembrance of the fight (see paper by the Rev. W. E.
Heygate "On the Danish Camps at Benfleet and Shoebury, and the Battle of
Ashingdon," Trans: Essex Archaeol: Soc: vol. ii (ser. I), p. 75).
A visit was then made to the Church, a very picturesque and interesting
building, built of rubble and stone, and is a patchwork of styles of the 14th and
15th centuries. There are clear tokens, Dr. Swete considered, of one, if not of
more than one, earlier building. During some internal re-arrangements in 1886
the foundations of a smaller church were brought to light. Part of an old font
long disused, and until lately forming a door step, and the arch over a stoup for
holy water, also recently disclosed, are of early Norman or pre-Norman workman-
ship. The pillars of the nave-arcades rest on square basements two or three feet
high, composed of squared Barnack stones ; and such stones have been freely
used in other parts of the present building, where strength was specially needed,
the latter work being merely of clunch or pebble. The Church stands upon a hill,
the ground falling away to the East to a valley known as Water Lane or Rock
Lane, which immediately below the hill widens out into pastures and arable land,
and goes off to the North in the direction of Bartlow. The slope between the
Church and the valley seems to bear marks of terracing, and Dr. Swete suggested
that it may have been the acre of vineyard mentioned in Domesday. It was
stated that some sixty years ago in a field in Water Lane, called Dean Meadow,
some graves containing rude weapons and (? Roman) pottery. But in 1882,
observing a large mound at the bottom of the field, Dr. Swete cut it open, and it
was found to consist of tons of lime, containing organic remains, chiefly the bones
of the sheep, ox, and horse, mixed with oyster shells and the shells of esculent
crawfish or the like.
Having thanked the Rector for his great kindness, a move was made for the
little hamlet of Bartlow, to inspect the four celebrated Hills or Tumuli, which
are (at present !) in Essex, and the quaint church with its round tower, one of the
finest examples of the kind in Cambridgeshire, for it is just "over the border.''
These barrows are of the greatest interest. The larger ones are 70 or 80 feet
high, planted with trees on the top. There are also indications of three smaller
barrows, which have been nearly obliterated by ploughing over. These last were
opened in 1832, 1835, and 1838, by the late Mr. John Gage, who published full
5 Dr. Swete's paper "On the Identification of Assanduna with Ashdon" is printed in Trans:
Essex Arch : Soc: vol. iv (N.S.), pp. 5—10.