MS: Huntington Library, RS 448. ALS; 2p.
Unpublished
I have recollected that you made a query concerning the covered ways of the Britons. Sir R Hoare calls them so, or “lines of communication from one British town to another’ p. 19 of his Ancient Wiltshire.
(1)
Sir Richard Colt Hoare (1758–1838; DNB), Ancient History of North and South Wiltshire, 2 vols (London, 1812–1819), II, p. 19.
he & your acquaintance Cunnington
(2)
William Cunnington (1754–1810; DNB), archaeologist, whose systematic investigation of barrows in Wiltshire was funded by Hoare.
were long puzzled by them, for their traces are frequent upon the Wiltshire downs, & he says, their intent was most clearly ascertained, by their connection with the site of the old towns, which you know Cunnington had so peculiar a talent for discovering. Turner, who was not aware of this tells us that the Kimmerians dwelt in subterreous habitations communicating by trenches,
(3)
The Cimmerians were a legendary people of Italy, who were supposed to live underground.
– & he finds the name of those dwellings preserved in Welsh. See his third edition. Vol 1. p. 40.
(4)
Sharon Turner, The History of the Anglo-Saxons from their First Appearance above the Elbe to the Death of Egbert, 3 vols (London, 1820), I, p. 40. Turner speculated about the possible descent of the Welsh from another group of people called the Cimmerians, who had invaded Assyria from north of the Caucasus in the eighth century BC. These Cimmerians were often ascribed the subterranean habits of their legendary namesakes – an error repeated by Turner. Southey possessed a second edition of this work from 1807, no. 2876 in the sale catalogue of his library.
Bertha is in a state of preparation. Miss Emma Pigott
(5)
Miss Pigott had accompanied Southey and Rickman and his family on their tour of Scotland in August–September 1819. It is difficult to be sure of her identity, but she might have been Emma Pigott (dates unknown), younger daughter and co-heiress of James Pigott (d. 1822) of Fitz-Hall, Iping, Sussex, who married, in 1824, Edward Brice Bunny (d. 1867) of Speen Hill, Berkshire.
I hear is about to be married. I heartily wish her happy.
Tell Mrs R. that I have resumed my long neglected Low Country-Journal.
(6)
Southey was sending the Rickmans instalments of a fair copy of his journal written on his trip to the Low Countries in 1815, later published as Journal of a Tour in the Netherlands in the Autumn of 1815 (1902).
RS.
26 March.
