We are able, however, to extend our view much beyond the Roman invasion, and to find the counterpart of the coffin in many primitive burials. Some of the stone cists which enclosed unburnt bodies of the older Bronze Age barrows are actually described as “coffin-shaped receptacles[669].” A Bronze Age barrow at Hove, Brighton, contained an oak coffin in which objects of bronze, stone, and amber had been deposited with the skeleton[670]. Belonging to the same period was the famous barrow of Gristhorpe, near Scarborough; in this example the interment had been made in a hollowed oak trunk, specially prepared for the purpose[671] (Fig. 55 A). King Barrow, near Wareham, Dorset, was found to be raised over a coffin, wherein a cup of shale had been deposited with the body[672]. Mr J. R. Mortimer asserts that traces of wooden supports for protecting the body are often found. In a barrow at Easington, in Holderness, broad slabs, made from the trunk of a willow, formed the covering. It would be superfluous to continue the list, but should the reader desire to examine further material in justification of the plea of continuity, he will find ample opportunity in Mr Llewellynn Jewitt’s interesting volume[673]. The Roman and pre-Roman periods have been considered; we turn to the Romano-British burials, and proceed in the forward direction. Gen. Pitt-Rivers discovered “dug-out” coffins at Woodyates, and other sites in Cranborne Chase, and he inferred the former existence of further specimens by the presence of nails which were associated with the burials. To ascertain whether the record can be extended into later historical times, we might turn especially to our Northern churchyards. Some examples of the stone cell, found at Alloa and elsewhere, are described by Sir Arthur Mitchell as being simply cists, enlarged so as to avoid doubling up the body[674]. Later stages of survival are witnessed by the rude box-shaped tombstones of many churchyards in Devonshire, Gloucestershire, and other counties[675]. Stone coffins have been dug up in the Dorsetshire graveyard of Worth Matravers, almost identical with those which have been unearthed from barrows in the surrounding Isle of Purbeck. In short, it is clear that the stone coffin and the table tombstone are derived from the ancient stone cist, and this, in its turn, bears some analogy to the chamber of the long barrow.