This town is not eminent for any manufacture, though a coarse kind of woollen cloth, used for waggon-tilts, &c. is made with some success. The corporation consists of two bailiffs, twelve burgesses, a town clerk, &c. These civil officers have entire jurisdiction within the town precincts, and formerly had power to imprison in cases of debt from 40s. to four pounds, inclusively. The town enjoys about two hundred acres of common land, which were given by one of the Fitzalans, Earls of Arundel. The common lands of the manor were enclosed in the year 1769, but the gift of the Earl of Arundel was excepted, and a portion of the benefit is now allotted to every house that was erected be fore the enclosure took place. William Fitzalan of Clun obtained from King John a charter for a yearly fair; and there are now seven fairs held annually in the town for the sale of cattle, &c. The weekly market is well attended, and two of the market days, the last Wednesday in March, and the last Wednesday in September, approach, in extent of business, to the character of fairs. Large quantities of cheese are then brought for sale. Corn is sold by sample in this market. The greater number of the inhabitants attend the established church; but there are meeting houses for Quakers, Methodists, and Baptists. The population, according to the returns to Parliament in 1811, is 1,975; and the number of houses 382. OVER, or UPPER NORTON, is a hamlet pleasingly situated on an elevation, and ornamented by the neat residence and extensive grounds of Mr. Dawkins. This hamlet has separate parochial rates, but owns Chipping Norton as the mother church. On the manor of COLD NORTON was a priory of canons regular of St. Augustine, founded by William Fitzalan, who died about the 19th of Henry II. and dedicated to St. John the Evangelist. The founder possessed a manor house at Cold Norton, which he gave to the prior and canons, or rather, in his own words, to God, St. Mary, St. John, and St. Giles. Reginald, Earl of Bologne, was a large benefactor; and the different gifts were confirmed by King Henry III. Among subsequent benefactors was Ralph, Earl of Stafford, who, in the 44th of Edward III. bestowed his manor of Rowlandright, (Rollwright,) in this county. In the eleventh of Henry VII. as it appears from an inquisition taken at Dorchester, John Wotton, prior of Cold Norton, died without having any convent of canons, or any professed canon in his priory, at the time of his decease. The succession of the priory, therefore, finished, and the estate escheated to the king. At this time the revenue was stated at 501. per annum. Bishop Smith afterwards bought it of the crown, and gave it to Brasennose College, Oxford. No vestige of the building can now be traced; but a farm and a mill still bear the name of Priory. CHAPEL HOUSE is the name given to an inn near the seventythird mile stone on the Birmingham Road. Here, according to Gough, was an antient chapel used by Pilgrims. In digging to enlarge the house several stone collins have been discovered, in one of which were found, among the bones, a number of beads, and a crucifix of silver. "Three urns, in a small vault like an oven," have also been found, and fragments of masonry and painted glass. ROLLRICH, or ROWLDRICH, STONES, the most curious memorial of antiquity to be seen in this county, are about three miles distant from Chipping Norton, on the north west. They are situate on an eminence which commands extensive views over long and intersecting ranges of hills, on every side except that towards Long Compton, which village, with its attendant phalanx of tall and far-spread elevations, is hidden from the eye by a trivial but abrupt brow of land. When the chief of the surrounding scenery consisted of intermingled heath and wood, the situation must have been impressively solemn and mysterious. The busy hands of an increased population have now denuded • Gough. most most of the elevations, and have softened the monotonous gloom of each wide expanse of heath; yet still the monument stands in solitary grandeur, amid scenes so profound, and immeasurable to the eye, that they inspire a species of melancholy feeling, even while enriched by the verdure of cultivation. Rollrich Stones form a ring which is not completely circular. The diameter from north to south is about 35 yards, and from east to west about 33. The original number of stones appears to have been 60. But every age has assisted in the work of mutilation and removal. There are now only twenty-four that are more than one foot above the level of the earth. These are of different degrees of elevation. Not any are more than five feet from the ground, except one, precisely at the north point, which is seven feet four inches high, and of an unequal but considerable breadth. The thickness of the remainder is usually not more than 13 or 14 inches. At the distance of 84 yards north east from the Circle stands what is termed the King Stone. This is about nine feet in height. On the east are the remains of the Five Knights. These are believed by Dr. Stukely to have formed a Kistvaen. The whole of the stones appear to have been taken from a contiguous quarry, and to have been placed in their present situation in a rude and unornamented state. Those in the ring were apparently pitched so close together, that Mr. Gale supposes they were intended to form a compact wall. The entrance seems to have been on the north east, in a line with the stone denominated the king. There are no marks of a surrounding trench, nor any of an avenue of approach, as at Stonehenge and Abury. Dr. Stukely mentions several barrows in the close vicinity; but he appears to have bestowed this appellation on a long and uneven bank, which was probably formed by the rabbish removed from the quarry that produced the stones. In the 17th century Ralph Sheldon, Esq. caused the area of the circle to be dug to a con siderable depth; but no indications of sepulture, or hints con 2 K 3 cernia cerning the founder of this curious monument, were discovered. From our statement of the dimensions of Rollrich it will be seen that this antient erection is trivial, if compared with the stupendous relics in Wiltshire; yet Bede does not scruple to reckon it the second wonder of this kingdom. All monuments reared by hands, which had mouldered into dust before the Chronicles commenced, afford a fertile subject to writers fond of hypothesis; and where is the antiquary devoid of such a partiality? Rollrich, accordingly, has given rise to a variety of conjectures. The populace, as usual, settle the question in a very succinct manner. With these traditionary historians, the whole assemblage is a kind of petrified court. The person now converted into the King Stone would have been King of England if he could but have perceived Long Compton, which village can be clearly seen at the distance of six yards from his base. The stones which composed Dr. Stukely's Kistvaen were five knights, attendant on the majesty of the larger and solitary fragment. The rest were common soldiers. We are chiefly induced to mention this popular fancy, from the circumstance of it appearing to blend, in a remote degree, with a system of conjecture formed by Dr. Plot. 4 Camden was the first writer who treated Rollrich with serious attention, and he was inclined to believe it a memorial of some victory, and thought that it possibly was erected by Rollo the Dane. "At the time," says Camden, "that Rollo ravaged England with his Danes and Normans, we find the Danes engag ed the Saxons hard by, at Hokenorton, and afterwards again at Scierstane in Huiccia, which I should suppose to be the adjoining boundary stone of the four counties." * In regard to this opinion Bishop Gibson observes" that the Saxon annals tell us it was in 876 that Rollo made inroads into Normandy, and that was after he had been in England; whereas the battle of Hokenorton was in 917, and that of Sceorstan a hundred years after." Dr. * The Four Shire Stone is six miles from Chippingnorton on the north-west. Dr. Plot is willing to allow that the monument might be erected by Rollo, not about the time of Edward the Elder, but when, as is asserted by Walsingham, he was called to the aid of King. Athelstan against some potent rebels, "whom having van * quished and reduced into obedience to their Prince, and perhaps too slain the designed king of them (who, possibly, might be persuaded to this rebellion upon a conditional prophecy of coming to that honour when he should see Long Compton,) might erect this monument in memory of the fact, the great single stone for the intended king, the five stones by themselves for his principal captains," &c. After having indulged in this vein of extravagant conjecture, Plot proceeds to say, that, though the stones might have been erected as a trophy, or triumphal pile, they might also serve at the same time for the election and inauguration of a king. In this he follows Dr. Charleton; who, in his "Stonehenge restor ed to the Danes," has shewn, on the authority of Wormius, that the northern tribes were accustomed to hold certain courts of Parliament, in which kings were solemnly elected, which are surrounded with great stones, for the most part twelve in number, and one other stone, exceeding the rest in eminency, set in the middle, upon which they seated the new elected king, by the general suffrage of the assembly. To this hypothesis Dr. Plot readily perceived two objections to arise:-the King Stone as Rollrich is not in the centre of the circle, and the succeeding kings of the Danish race are known to have been inaugurated at other places. These difficulties he endeavours to surmount by proving that the King Stone was sometimes placed on an elevated spot without the circle; and by remarking that succeeding kings, less boisterous in manners, and more politic in design, might 2 K 4 • Gibson observes that the testimony of Walsingham is of no avail, unless we can suppose that Rollo was of an age to plunder England in the year 875; to make incursions into Normandy in 876; and the same Rollo live to assist King Athelstan, who came not to the crown till the year 925. |