button to main menu   West's Guide to the Lakes, 1778/1821

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Page 124:-
  roman camps
ANTIQUITIES. Caer-mot is about two miles further to the north, on the great road to old Carlisle and Wigton. It is a green high-crowned hill, and on its skirt, just by the road side, are the manifest vestiges of a square encampment, inclosed with a double foss, extending from east to west, 120 paces, and from south to north, 100 paces. It is subdivided into several cantonments, and the road from Keswick to old Carlisle has crossed it at right angles. Part of the agger is visible where it issues from the north side of the camp, till where it falls in with the line of the present road. It is distant about ten miles from Keswick, and as much from old Carlisle, and is about two miles west of Ireby.
Camden proposes Ireby for the Arbeia of the Romans, where the Bercarii Tigrinensis were garrisoned, but advances nothing in favour of his opinion. The situation is such as the Romans never made choice of for a camp or garrison, and there remains no vestiges of either. By its being in a deep glen, among surrounding hills, where there is no pass to guard, or country to protect, a body of men would be of no use. On the northern extremity of the said hill of Caer-mot, are the remains of a beacon, and near it the vestiges of a square encampment, inclosed with a foss and rampart of 60 feet by 70. This camp is
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gazetteer links
button -- (beacon, Bewaldeth and Snittlegarth)
button -- Ireby
button -- "Caer mot" -- Caermote
button -- (roman road, Brougham to Moresby)

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