Page:Notes on the churches in the counties of Kent, Sussex, and Surrey.djvu/261

209 former was held by the priory, "St. Pancras," of the Earl of Surrey, doubtless by gift of the latter, but Burgemere was still in lay hands, as shown by the quotation above.

The Burgemere of (D.B.) may satisfactorily be identified in Boro'mer or Bor'mer, pronounced Bawmer, a very small hamlet in the parish of Falmer, about a mile northward from the church; where apparently was a considerable settlement in old times, which is indicated also by the term "burgh" or borough. No building can be recognised as probably the ancient chapel, nor could any intelligence be obtained on the spot of a "Chapel Field," or "Chapel Croft," though the road toward the village of Falmer is called "Church Lane;" but one house, formerly a farm-house, now only a cottage, has a stone doorcase, Perp., though perfectly plain. The farm buildings contain merely a very few stones, which appear to have been used before. The ground north-westward from the hamlet presents plain marks of former edifices: on the opposite, that is, on the eastern, side is a pond, which, once perhaps having been very large, would then have supplied the inhabitants with water; and the steep slope on the north-east, now partially planted, seeming to possess some natural wood, might have been the site of the "wood of four hogs," specified in (D.B.) This case however is a remarkable instance of the irregularity, prevailing in early times, with regard to boundaries, and which even now subsists in the detached portions of counties and parishes, lying at a distance from the districts, to which they belong. For Burgemere is stated in (D.B.) to be in the hundred of "Welesmere," which comprised no other manors save those of Bristelmestune, Rotingedene, and Hovingedene, Falmer being then in a hundred of its own name. Whereas Bor'mer is entirely separated by the southern part of the parish from the remainder of its original hundred, the nearest portion of which must be about half a mile, or more, from Falmer church.—A gold armilla, "formed of two square bars or wires, wreathed together, and welded at the extremities," was turned up in ploughing the Downs near Bor'mer, and is preserved in the museum of Dr. Mantell, to whom it was presented by the late Earl of Chichester. A figure of it is given in Horsfield (Hist. of Lewes, pi. IV.) See (Archæol. Journal, VI, 58.)—An accidental discovery in the summer of A.D. 1849 seems to show, that this neighbourhood was of importance even previous to the era of K. William I. Some labourers, in digging for flints at the head of a hollow in the Downs about half a mile north-east of