Somerset Rivers
River Alham Structures

Bolter’s Bridge

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Bridge Name:   Bolter’s Bridge
No.:   17
Location:    
Build Date:    
Engineer:    
     
       
 

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Description:    
Medieval masonary pack horse/footbridge built of lias rubble, with four segmental pointed archways,rough hewn voussoirs, three triangular cutwaters and cobbled deck. Reputedly built by the Abbots of Glastonbury to connect the two parts of the moor and to make a road between Castle Cary and Glastonbury. English Heritage Listed Building Number: 267654.

” The Rev. Prebendary Thring read extracts from a letter of Mr. Dickinson, on this bridge, as follows : � ” The authority for ‘Bolter’s Bridge,’ . . . depends on the boundaries of Ditcheat, given in the Glastonbury Chartularies. … In them ‘ Bolam tree ‘ is mentioned where the bridge now is ; the am is a case, dative, I think, and the word in the nominative would be ‘ Bol-tre.’ I should like the antiquaries to explain ‘ Bol,’ and also make out the date of the bridge.
Bola is a pr. name in A.S. See ” bofa, aldred bola.” Folkestone Charter, A.D. 824. (Sweet’s Oldest English Text, p. 450.) Prof. Skeat says�” I think that Bola’s tree is a possible solution, and that is something, but as a rule nothing is known about place names.
It is very picturesque ; round arches and pointed confused. . . . A pointed arch like this is likely to be late. . . . Toothill bridge, between Barton and Baltonsborough, is round.” The Rev. J. A. Bennett said that the pack-horse road, of which there are still a few of the original side stones remaining, as well as the bridge, were made by the monks of Glastonbury as a communication between their two properties of Glastonbury and Bruton.”2
     
References:   1.Somerset HER������ �
2.SOMERSETSHIRE ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY society’s proceedings, 1890. VOL. XXXVI