Georgian Books, The Beauties of England and Wales

At the south end of the village of Eamont, (vulgarly called Yeammon Bridge,) is ARTHUR'S ROUND-TABLE, a curious circle, consisting of a high dyke of earth, and a deep foss within, surrounding an area twenty-nine yards in diameter. It has two entrances exactly opposite to each other, and forming an uninterrupted: plane through the ditch from the outside of the table to its area. Some suppose it to have been designed for tilting matches, and that the champions entered at each opening¹ others that it was a Roman amphitheaire.² Richard, Duke of Gloucester, is still traditionally extolled in these parts for his great splendour and hospitality while he was governor of the neighbouring castle of Penrith, which induces Hutchinson to suppose this circus may have been in use as a tilting-ground in his time.³ On the adjoining plain are a larger ring, with low ramparts, and some smaller ones, at present scarcely visible, as if gymnastic exerscises, for which this county is still famous, had been practised in them. Circles, indeed, have been the theatres of contests in every age. In sudden quarrels the mob formed themselves into a ring, in which the parties settled the dispute by single combat

Considere duces et vulgi stante corona

Surgit ad hos, &c.

Note 1. Pennant's North Tour.

Note 2. Archaeologia, Vol. 5.

Note 3. His. of Cum. I. 310. [Note. Reference to An Excusion to the Lakes Page 91].

Entellus threw his huge gauntlets in medium; and, after stripping, off his garments "media constitit arena¹." The same custom is observable. in the common cock-fights and boxing-matches of this day. The games of the South-Sea islanders were performed in circles. Saxo Grammaticus tells us that the duels of the northern nations were fought in rings; and when the occasion was particular, as in the contentions of princes or noblemen, the circus was formed with wooden pales, or with turf or stones, The spectators stood upon the terrace; and, at the signal of the heralds, the combatants rushed upon the area from the opposite entrances. We copy Saxo's account of the duel between Ubbo and Slavus:—"Nec mora: circulatur campus, milite circus stipatur, concurrunt pugiles, fit frangor, fremit spectatrix tarba votorum discors. Excandescunt igitur athlete animis, et mutuis in vulueribus ruentes, eandem lucis; ac pugne exitium sortiuntur", The conquered were allowed the privilege of funeral rites when the contention had originated in a point of honour; if not, their "flesh was given to the fowls of the air, and to the beasts of the field." The tumuli, near the tilting-grounds on Thornborough Common, strengthen the conjecture that places of this kind were used in contests of honour.

Note 1. "he stood in the middle of the sand".

Note 2. "No delay: the field is encircled, the arena is crowded with soldiers, the fighters rush in, there is a clash, the crowd of spectators roars with discordant shouts. Therefore, the athletes grow fierce in spirit, and rushing into mutual wounds, they share the same fate of light; and death in battle".

Bishop Gibson has taken much pains to prove that this place and Mayborough are memorials of a peace which Constantine, king of Scotland, Huval, king of the western Britons, and Wuer, king of the Wenti, were forced to make with king Athelstan, June 27, 926. Hovedon and Simeon, of Durham¹, mention this ‘convention, and say it was held at a place called Eimotun, Previous to this treaty, Athelstan and Constantine had entered into a friendly alliance at Dacor,+ which Camden thinks was the same as Dacre, in Cumberland, a village about three miles west of this place.

Note 1. Twyd. Edit. Col. 156.

Mayborough [Mayburgh Henge [Map]] is seated on a gentle eminence on the wests side of Eamont-bridge. It consists of a circular barrier of loose stones, near thirty yards wide at the base, and from twelve to fifteen feet high in the centre: the entrance is on the east, about twelve yards wide, and the area about ove hundred yards in diameter. The barrier is thinly clothed with trees and shrubs. Near the centre of the area is an unhewn column, twelve feet high, and twenty-five feet in girth, In the memory of persons yet alive there were four of these columns: the three that were blasted and broken formed a square with that which remains. Four also stood at the entrance, namely, one at each exterior, and one at each interior corner of the barrier¹. "Many of the larger stones," says Dr. Burn, "were taken in the reign of King Henry VI for the repairing of Kendal castle; but this he advances on the strength of mere tradition; and the circumstance of the stones being all of the loose rounded kind, such as the beds of rivers produce, strongly opposes the supposition that the barrier was ever faced with regular ashlar work. Indeed, it has altogether the appearance of being constructed by a people unacquainted with the art of masonry.

Note 1. Hutch. Cumb, 1. 310.