Dorchester was a Romano-British town of considerable size, probably successor to the British tribal centre of the Durotriges. The walls can be traced in part, and many mosaics and other remains of houses have been found. Near Dorchester may be seen at Maumbury Rings remains of an amphitheatre. Maiden Castle, 2 miles S.W. of the town, is a vast earthwork, considered to have been a stronghold of the Durotriges.2 Many other such remains are traceable in the vicinity.
2 Mai-den = Mai Dun = the stronghold of the plain. It is clearly originally the work of men of the latest Stone Age—men who lived their lives in round barrows, and who raised this entrenchment with merely their primitive picks or "celts" as tools, for a defence against their finally successful invaders, the Durotriges. In their turn, the latter used the forts against the Romans—unless, as is more probable, they submitted without fighting.
DORCHESTER (Oxfordshire).—Situated at the junction of the Thames and the Thame.
There is a Roman station near the present village, and (across the Thames) the double isolated mound known as Wittenham Hills (Sinodum), on the summit of which are strong early earthworks. In 655, this place was the seat of a bishopric, the largest in England, including the whole of Wessex and Mercia. In 1086, William the First and Bishop Remigius removed the bishop's stool to Lincoln.
DOVER.—Roman Dubris, on the Dour (dwr—water), the principal Cinque port, is situated close to the South Foreland, and is 72 miles from London.
It is the eye of England, looking over to the nearest part of the continent. It is also the gate of England, through which have come and gone in all historic ages kings and queens and lesser folk on all kinds of missions, relating both to war and peace. Geologically it is knit to the French shore, by the existence both of white and black rocks, i.e., chalk and coal. At a time when Britain was joined to what is now Europe, when the cave bear devoured his prey in Kent's cavern, and the monkey gambolled in the lofty trees, when the Thames was a tributary of some great eastern stream, the Dour might have been a considerable river, as it has worked for itself a deep erosive valley. Even in early historic times its estuary must have occupied a great part of the land on which stands modern Dover. Originally wood fires were lighted on corresponding sites on the E. and W. cliffs to guide vessels into the intermediate beach and natural harbour during the darkness of a winter's night. Even when the Pharos was reared, the primitive mode of illumination by means of wood or coal was employed. The modern form of lighthouse, with glass or metal reflectors, dates but from 1758, when the first Eddystone lighthouse was built. A common coal fire-light was continued at St. Bees Head, in Cumberland, as late as 1820. Architecturally, the Dover Pharos (so called from one erected at Pharos, Alexandria, in 285 B.C.—550 ft. high—said to have been visible 42 miles away) is interesting from the fact that the stones from which it is built are not native, but are supposed to have been brought over as ballast in Roman galleys. In some places it would appear that they were built up wall-shape, liquid cement being poured into the interstices. That the ubiquitous King Arthur built the first castle on the cliffs, 300 ft. above the sea, is a tradition—one we should like to believe. His name is also associated with sites on the Western Heights and Barham Downs. It is certain that the Roman invaders early took advantage of the position of this "key" of the island, and that amongst their five coast castles, under the control of "the Count of the Saxon Shore," Dover held a position second only to Richborough. In the Watling Street, the baths, now destroyed, the church within the Castle, the Pharos, the Romans have left clear evidence of their occupation. St. Mary's may be the first Christian church in Britain. To the beginning of the eighteenth century it was used for worship; it was then dismantled, and, after being filled with stores, at last became a coal cellar. With the greatest difficulty it was saved from destruction in 1860, and restored by Sir Gilbert Scott.
EXETER.—172 miles, W.S.W. from London.