CHILTERN (ALL-SAINTS), a parish in the hundred
of HEYTESBURY ,county of WILTS, 4 miles (E.N.E.)
from Heytesbury, containing 381 inhabitants. The
living is a discharged vicarage, to which is united the
vicarage of Chiltern St. Mary, in the archdeaconry and
diocese of Salisbury, rated in the king's books at
£7- 0. 10., and in the patronage of the Bishop and.the
Dean and Chapter of Salisbury alternately. Chiltern
lies adjacent to the Chiltern downs, a chain of chalk
hills which, from the nature of the soil, was called by
the Saxons Gilt, or Chilt. They were anciently covered
with impenetrable woods, infested by robbers, until
Leofstan, abbot of St. Albans, thinned them, and the
Danes burnt them down in 1009. By accepting the
nominal stewardship of this district under the crown, a
member of parliament is enabled to vacate his seat.
Westward from this place is a small Roman camp, named
Knooke Castle; and near it an irregular ditch running
in various directions, as if intended to form some ancient
boundary-line.