Copy 1, Volume 1

Traditions, legends, superstitions, and sketches of Devonshire on the borders of the Tamar and the Tavy illustrative of its manners, customs, history, antiquities, scenery, and natural history, in a series of letters to Robert Southey, esq / By Mrs. Bray.

  • Anna Eliza Bray
Date:
1838
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Traditions, legends, superstitions, and sketches of Devonshire on the borders of the Tamar and the Tavy illustrative of its manners, customs, history, antiquities, scenery, and natural history, in a series of letters to Robert Southey, esq / By Mrs. Bray. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    67/410 (page 57)
    1¥e] TOR-HEIGHTS. adi heathen nations, was also held sacred by the Druids, and the noblest altars and temples were dedicated to his honour. The sun was adored under various names, but none more commonly than that of Belus, or Bel*; and on Dartmoor we have Bel-tor to this day. The sun, and also the moon, were sometimes worshipped under the names of Mithra or Misor : on the moor we have Mis-tor, a height on whose con- secrated rocks there is found so large and perfect a rock-basin as to be called by the peasantry Mis-tor Pan. Ham, or Ammon, was ranked amongst the British deities: on Dartmoor the heathen god still possesses his eminence, unchanged in name, as we there find Hum-tor to this day; and my venerable and learned friend, the Rev. Mr. Polwhele, in his ‘History of Devon,’ refers to the worship of that deity all the numerous Hams of this county;.. We have also a spot which you as a poet must visit,— Baird-down (pronounced Bair-down), which Mr. Bray conjectures to mean the hill of bards; and, opposite to it, Wistman’s, or (as he also conjectures) Wiseman’s Wood, of which I shall presently speak in a very particular manner, as embracing some of the most remarkable points of Druid antiquity to be found throughout the whole range of the moor. We learn from Cesar, and other classical writers, that the Druids lived in societies and formed schools, * Borlase notices these tors on Dartmoor as still bearing the names of Druid gods. 7 According to Kennet’s ‘ Glossary,’ however, Hamma is from the Saxon Ham, a house; hence Hamlet, a collection of houses. It some- times meant an enclosure; hence to fem or surround. This is the seuse in which it seems chiefly used in Devonshire, as the South- hams, &c. D3