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Kits Cotty House, Kent

Historical Description

Kits Cotty House, a large cromlech in Aylesford parish, Kent, on a hillside adjacent to the river Medway, 3½ miles N by W of Maidstone. It consists of three upright stones and an overlying one, and forms a small chamber, open in front. One of the side stones measures 7½ feet by 7, is 2 feet thick, and weighs about 8¼ tons; the other side stone measures 8½ feet by 8, and weighs about 8 tons; and the overlying stone measures 12 feet by 9½ , is 2½ feet thick, and weighs about 10½ tons. The cromlech is traditionally said to have been constructed to the memory of Catigern, slain here while fighting against the Saxons under Hengist; but it really is the centre of a group of monuments, which probably indicate a great necropolis of the Belgian settlers in this part of England, and which appears to have been connected by a stone avenue, 7 miles in length, with another group in the parish of Addlngton. Smaller monuments of the same description as the cromlech cover the brow of the hill above it; a group, called the Countless Stones, is in a field immediately below, and a boulder, called the White Horse Stone, and traditionally regarded as the coronation place of Hengist, was formerly on the top of the hill, but has been destroyed. Very curious excavations, mostly circular shafts opening at the bottom into one or more chambers, and seemingly of sepulchral character, are along the brow of the adjacent chalk hills on both sides of the river. Many ancient British coins, great quantities of broken ancient pottery, traces of a very large Roman villa, and indications of a Roman burial-ground have been found in the neighbourhood.

Transcribed from The Comprehensive Gazetteer of England & Wales, 1894-5

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