the case at the present time. Besides, a small amount only of actual timber and copse would support the character of "Forest," since a wide extent of reeds (indigenous, and alone an effectual cover), with thickets of alder, willow, or other bushes, and an occasional large tree, dispersed at intervals over the swampy plain, would have afforded ample concealment to the fugitive Britons. Wherefore the chronicler's statement, that the Britons, when repulsed by the Saxon besiegers of Andredesceaster, "ran into the woods," speedily to return to the attack, is far from being so unsuitable to the circumstances of this district, as may on a cursory consideration be imagined.
2. Secondly, we are to answer the objection that Pevensey does not fulfil the condition of "desolation," ascribed to the site of Andredesceaster. And here it is necessary to repeat, what seems to be generally forgotten, what perhaps is quite unknown to many, that by the two names, Anderida and Pevensey, we do not designate one and the same spot. To arrive at positive certainty with regard to events and circumstances of remote ages, whereof no records survive, is impossible; but if the Caer Pensavel Coit of the Britons[1] be the place now called Pevensey, it is a presumption, if not quite a deduction, that the appellations, Pensavel and Anderida, were in contemporaneous use. But, whether this was actually the case or not, it is undeniable, that the existing little town of Pevensey, though it stands side by side with, is perfectly distinct from, does not even encroach upon, the enclosed space formerly occupied, we contend, by the Romans as a fortified station, which they styled Anderida. The only English historian, it is believed, who affirms the continued desolation of Andredesceaster is Henry of Huntingdon, who flourished in the twelfth century, and his statement that "it was never
- ↑ Baxter however understands this name to intend Ilchester in Somersetshire, interpreting the meaning as "At the head of a river mouth in a wood (Ad caput fluminei oris in silvâ)," that wood being the Forest of Selwood. (Gloss. Antiq. Britan., p. 141). The same authority also (ut sup., p. 176) considers Pevensey to be the "Miba" of the Ravenna geographer, wherein he may not improbably be correct, as the word immediately follows Anderesio or Anderelio, which is supposed to imply Anderida, and if Miba be a separate name, the fact will remove some perplexity as to the reading of the original. But in this instance Baxter is less happy in arguing from etymology, than is often the case. Elsewhere he is clearly wrong, it is conceived, in suggesting Chichester as the site of Anderida, though he too takes Anderesio to mean that place. He explains the word Anderida as signifying "The two passages," (ut sup., p. 17).
