Page:Medieval Military Architecture in England (volume 1).djvu/415

 The Castle of Christchurch, Hants. 385 which washed the walls of Great Andelys, and completely enveloped the lower town. These additional defences are now destroyed and the lake is drained and filled up, but indications remain sufficient to verify the detailed description of Guillaume le Breton, and to justify M. Deville in his description, and M. le Due, in his restora- tions, advanced under the excellent articles "Chateau" and "Donjon" in his " Dictionary." THE CASTLE OF CHRISTCHURCH, HANTS. HE town, castle, and priory of Christchurch are placed upon J_ the south-eastern point and edge of a tongue of moderately- high ground, which intervenes between the Stour on the west and the Avon on the east. The two rivers of Dorset and Wilts meander like their prototype, and flow across broad and marshy tracts of land to unite below Christchurch in a spacious inlet of the bay which is formed, and on the south-east protected, by the headland bearing the suggestive name of Hengistbury. The position is thus strong and convenient : unapproachable, by reason of the marshes, on the east and west ; presenting to the north a narrow and defencible front, and placed upon a harbour in former days very suitable for small vessels, shel- tered from the prevailing west wind, and having a narrow and easily- guarded entrance from the adjacent channel. Such a position was not likely to be neglected by any people, even in the rudest age, and accordingly the Britons seem to have fortified the headland : and those who drove them out not only gave to that headland its present name, but, finding the inner position better suited to their habits, fortified it with bank and ditch, and within the area so enclosed threw up the usual mound, or burh, the ordinary indication of the residence of an early English chieftain. The remains of the British period are confined to the double banks and ditches, which still crown the headland, and to the names of the rivers, which there unite. Of a British town or church, Aberdour, as such would have probably been called, no traces are to be found. The earliest mention of the place in Anglo-Saxon records is in the Chronicle in a.d. 901, where it is recorded, that on the death of Alfred and the succession of Edward the Elder, ^thelwold, his uncle's son, seized the vill at " Winburne and that at Tweoxneam," but on Edward's marching to Badbury, and threatening an attack on .. . . toties qui terris errat in isdem," 2 C