Page:VCH Bedfordshire 1.djvu/352

 A HISTORY OF BEDFORDSHIRE and south the downs rise out of the wide surrounding plain. It is thus only approachable by the old green trackway which leads along the heights from Dunstable past Maiden Bower. The surface of the plateau has been artificially levelled, and fine linches terrace the face of the hill on the east. From this side an oblong camp-like enclosure is first entered, with straight scarped sides and rectangular. There are no ramparts on the north or south, and the steeps on the latter side are precipitous. The east moat remains in good condition, but there is now no proper ram- part, the ground sloping up so as to make a steep scarp to the ditch. It has been maintained that this outer enclosure was originally a Roman camp, but this is not certain since such rectilinear oblongs do occur in connection with manorial strongholds. 1 On the other hand these mounded works might very well at times be inserted inside earlier stations, as appears to have been the case at Little Wymondley in Herts, where a moated mound and courts are placed within an almost quadrangular en- closure, in which Roman foundations of some length have been uncovered. Only excavation can settle the point. As to the class of work at the west end of the oblong there can be no question. A great rounded mound with wide enclosing fosse, except where its base touches the scarp of the steep descent, stands in the centre. It rises to a height of some 23 feet above the bottom of the fosse, and is or the same globular form as Cainhoe, except that the top, 40 feet in dia- meter, is now flattened, and has a slight circular depression at the summit. There are two wards, one small, to the west, the other large and covering the mound both on the north and east, where it ends at the edge of the descent. Both were ramparted, and are separated from each other and the mound by the interior moats. The level of the east ward is some 6 feet above the larger one, and that is about the same above the outer plateau. There is a small stretch of rampart at the north-west angle, outside the exterior moat, and bending inwards, as though to cover an entrance at this point. The inner moat here is twice interrupted to form two banks of communication between the wards. Close to the inner rampart of the large court, near to the mound, is a small circular feature which has given rise to many conjectures. The rampart con- tinues round its edge, producing a central hollow 1 1 feet deep. It is known as the ' Money-pit,' from an old idea that any one jumping into the hollow could hear the rattle of coin below. The place may be the mouth of a shaft, perhaps leading down to the bottom of the heights near the brook. 2 A smaller excrescence of the same kind adjoins it. The ground outside the work slopes gently away to the north-east. The position is a majestic one, and to those moving on the lower plains for miles round, the Totternhoe mound seems to keep watch on its height like some great conning-tower. 3 1 As at Blctsoe, see p. 301. a As at Huntingdon, where the mouth of such a passage was recently discovered leading to another part of the work. s Compare for a very similar plan the Chateau de Grimbosc. — Du Caumont, AbeceJaire d'Aixkco- hgte, i. 298. 294