Another group of barrows on Lake Down used to be called the Prophets' Barrows, not from supposed prophets buried in them, but on account of a company of Hugenots, exiles from their native land, who in 1710 set up a standard on the largest of the group - a huge flat-topped mound - and preached from it to the country people, who named them the French Prophets.
It is interesting to think of the grave voice of the coming Methodism lifted up here in this large down country, where there is little to distract the mind from the great issues of life; with Stonehenge on the one hand and the spire on the other. The preachers are said to have roused the listening crowds to enthusiasm, but what abiding impression they made is not told.
According to Aubrey, on the downs, where the shepherds labour hard, the people have not "leisure to contemplate of religion, but goe to bed to their rest, to rise betime the next morning to their labour." Whereas in North Wiltshire "(a dirty, clayey country) where the people feed chiefly on milk meates, which cooles their braines too much," they "are more apt to be fanatiques."
Aubrey should have known, he was born in North Wiltshire. From 'Salisbury Plain' by Ella Noyes (1913).
Bronze Age bowl barrow, listed by Grinsell as Wilsford 43, and part of the Lake Group of barrows recorded as SU 14 SW 51. The barrow allegedly acquired its name in the early 18th century after French "prophets" set up their standard on it and preached to local people (circa 1710). Excavated in the early 19th century by Colt Hoare, who found a primary cremation in what he described as a wooden box in a large cist. Accompanying the cremation were a bronze dagger and a perforated whetstone-pendant. The barrow is extant as a mutilated mound 1.5 metres high.
A Bronze Age bowl barrow, listed by Grinsell as Wilsford 43, and part of the Lake Group of barrows recorded as SU 14 SW 51.
The barrow allegedly acquired its name in the early 18th century after French "prophets" set up their standard on it and preached to local people (circa 1710).
Excavated in the early 19th century by Colt Hoare, who found a primary cremation in what he described as a wooden box in a large cist. Accompanying the cremation were a bronze dagger and a perforated whetstone-pendant.
The barrow is extant as a mutilated mound 1.5 metres high.
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