Grave-mounds and Their Contents: A Manual of Archæology, as Exemplified in the Burials of the Celtic, the Romano-British, and the Anglo-Saxon PeriodsJewitt, Llewellynn Frederick William
History
Grave-mounds and Their Contents: A Manual of Archæology, as Exemplified in the Burials of the Celtic, the Romano-British, and the Anglo-Saxon Periods
Jewitt, Llewellynn Frederick William
Great Britain -- Antiquities; Megalithic monuments -- Great Britain; Mounds -- Great Britain
“Above this cist a cairn of fragments of sandstone had been raised
most likely before interments by cremation were practised on the spot.
The dark horizontal line of our woodcut indicates the situation of a
stratum of burnt earth traversing the barrow at this height. Funereal
rites, by incineration, had evidently been celebrated on this surface;
which was scattered over with a thin layer of wood-charcoal. In the
centre of the barrow, and resting upon this carbonaceous deposit,
stood a fine urn of dark British pottery, 11 inches high, and 9 at its
greatest diameter at the top; not in the more commonly inverted, but
in an upright position. It is ornamented in the usual style of lineal
impressions, most probably made by a twisted thong of untanned leather,
with rows of lines, alternately upright and horizontal, around the
upper division; and in the middle the lines are varied into the zigzag,
having distinct _crosses_ and other impressions in the intervals. It
contained calcined bones in a clean state, and mingled with them a
portion of the jaw of some animal; bones of the water-vole (_Arvicola
amphibius_, Desmar.), so common in the Derbyshire barrows; a bone
pin, 4 inches in length, and finely pointed; and a flint arrow-head;
all calcined. The urn was closed by a large flat stone, the two ends
of which rested upon side walls, so as to protect the deposit, and
secure it from superincumbent pressure. Did this urn contain the
inconsiderable yet sacred remains of one whose devotion in life the
distinguished dead below had oft experienced--one who held life itself
subordinate to his fate? The fearful conjecture seems not by any means
improbable.
“Interred in the soil above this portion of the barrow, and lying
amongst loose stones, the remains of four other skeletons occurred,
placed in the primitive flexed position. One of these had apparently
been disturbed at no long period subsequent to interment, and the bones
laid in order before they had become decayed--a practice adopted by
some uncivilized people in more modern times.
“This barrow of the British period presents unquestionable evidences
of very primeval times, and contained the relics of a true aboriginal
inhabitant of these islands, piously laid in his last resting-place
with great care, but in all rude simplicity. It is rich in instruction,
and marked by precise phases of information. It shows almost certainly
the contemporaneous adoption of inhumation and cremation--the latter,
perhaps, yielding to the first a short precedency; or possibly, in this
instance, a rite of the nature of a “Suttee,” and subordinate to the
former.”
[27] Warne’s “Celtic Tumuli of Dorsetshire.”
[28] _Celt_, from _Celtis_, a chisel.
[29] This is one of the largest examples which have been found. It is
in my own collection, having been most kindly presented to me by the
Hon. and Rev. C. Willoughby.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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