It is hoped to include in each issue a selection of recent publications of interest to members on the local history and archaeology of the surrounding area and topics of general historical interest. Mrs Pat Knight, the society’s Honorary Librarian would be pleased to learn of other recent titles which members of the society may have found particularly interesting or helpful, so that this information can be passed on in future editions.

Michael Aston and R.H:Leech. Historic Towns in Somerset: Archaeology and Planning. (Committee for Rescue Archaeology in Avon, Gloucestershire, and Somerset, 1977. £6-00)

Arranged alphabetically by towns, local ones including Bruton, Castle Cary, Chard, Crewkerne, Ilchester, Langport, Milborne Port, Montacute, Somerton, Stoford, Wincanton, and Yeovil. Gives historical summary of each town with maps showing past and post 1945 development.

J.H.Bettey. Rural Life in Wessex 1500-1900. (Moonraker Press, 1977. £4.95)

Describes the life and work of the people who lived in the rural communities of Wiltshire, Somerset, Dorset, and the modern county of Avon from the Tudor period until the end of the 19th century.

Leslie Brooke. The Book of Yeovil. (Barracuda Books Ltd, 1978. £9.00)

Illustrated and updated history of the town by one of our own members.

J.M.Coles, editor. Somerset Levels Papers No.4, 1978. Available from Department of History, University of Exeter. £3.00)

Archaeology of the area with chapters by individual contributors.

J.Stevens Cox, editor. Ilchester and District Occasional Papers.

No.9 – Extracts from the Chaplain’s Journal Ilchester Gaol 1821-1821.

Transcript of a manuscript journal discovered by the editor in 1949.

No.10 – Ilchester Borough Records of the 17th century.
Transcript of original manuscripts in the archives of Phelips of Montacute, now in the Somerset Record Office.

(Toucan Press, 1978. £1-40 the two).

Patricia Dirsztay. Church Furnishings. A NADFAS Guide. (Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978. £2.50)

Church furnishings terminology explained and illustrated with the intention of providing a means of accurately describing the various objects to be found in our parish church and other ecclesiastical extablishments.

Anton Fagersten. The Placenames of Dorset. (E.P.Publishing Ltd. 1978. £5.95)

Reprint of a volume first published in 1933. Derivation of all the county’s place-names as recorded in medieval documents with local pronunciations.

L.C.Hayward. The Romans &t Ilchester, Lufton, Yeovil and District. (Yeovil Archaeological and Local History Society. 1978. £1.30)

No one is better qualified to write the story of the Roman occupation in our neighbourhood than our own former chairman, and in this, the first of our own Society’s publications, Mr.Hayward has produced an easy-to-read but nonetheless authoritative and fully illustrated booklet which brings together in graphic manner the interpretation of local excavations, two of which were under the authors direction.

A.D.Mills. The Place-Names of Dorset, Part I. (English Place-Name Society. 1977. £8.50)

This volume, 52nd in a series of the place-names of England, is to be one of at least four on the place-names of Dorset and covers eight Hundreds in the south-east of the county. The area includes the Isle of Purbeck, the valleys of the Frome, Piddle or Trent, and the Wey; and
the towns of Wareham, Weymouth and Dorchester, Major names are included, plus minor ones such as those of farms, hills, streams, ponds, lanes, woods, and fields.

T.L.Stoate, editor. Dorset Tudor Muster Rolls, 1539, 1542, and 1569. (T.L.Stoate, Lower Court, Almondsbury, Bristol, 1978. £3.00 plus 80p. p & p.)

These records of the majority of adult males who served in the Militia in Dorset, are almost complete for one year or another for the whole county and list nearly 14,000 names with details of armour and weapons held. The introduction to the work surveys the whole history of Militia Muster Records for all English counties.

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