Aconbury, or Acornbury, by facile philology means the Acorn Camp—an entrenched hill camp surrounded by oak forests—a very natural description. The camp is almost 600 yards long, and from 130 to 220 yards broad, or a long oval containing about twenty acres, and in addition to the Camp proper, a still larger surface of the hill is entrenched around, and was probably stockaded for cattle. It may have been the scene of the struggles of the ancient Britons under CaracturusCaractacus against the Roman legions; of the fierce Mercian chieftain Crida, who from his principal camp at Credenhill burnt and destroyed all the Roman camps and stations in this and the neighbouring counties; or it may have been occupied by Elyston Glodrydd, the last of the royal tribes of Wales. The hill first appears in history as a beacon station, and in the Scudamore M.S.S. is a document endorsed: “Things belonging to Aconbury Beacon in Kydley’s hands, 1625,” namely an iron pole, piche and rosen and tallowe and towe.
Source info: MS note by AW “Hereford Journal”, no date.
The snippet about Aconbury as a beacon station appears in The Old Straight Track, page 102.