Derbyshire (England) -- Antiquities; Derbyshire (England) -- History
Of the other barrows of the type, little can be said of their
structure. Several have been opened or destroyed by labourers, and the
rest have only been slightly examined. Mr. Bateman examined examples
at Ringham-low, near Monyash; Bolehill, near Bakewell; Stoneylow and
Greenlow, near Brassington; Smerrill, near Youlgreave; and a second
one at Mininglow. They all appear to have been constructed with stone,
and their chambers to have been on a megalithic scale. He makes no
mention of galleries, but as his efforts were confined to clearing out
the ruined chambers, he might easily have overlooked their remains.
With the exception of the first-mentioned, they were all circular, but
his plan and description of that barrow leave it uncertain whether its
curious outline was original or due to additions. The remaining three
barrows—the great one near Chelmerton,[4] one near Wardlow,[5] and one
on Derwent Moor,[6] have only a doubtful claim to be included in the
chambered class. They were broken into a century or more ago, and the
accounts of them are very meagre.
[4] _Pilkington_, _View of Derbyshire_, ii., 424.
[5] _Philosoph. Trans._, 1759.
[6] _Ten Years’ Diggings_, 254.
Unfortunately, all the chambers in this county which have been
searched from scientific motives had already been rifled, but that at
Harborough Rocks had suffered least. Here the mound had been almost
entirely removed for the sake of its materials, the capstone of the
chamber had been thrown over, and many of the skeletons it contained
scattered; but, fortunately, six of these remained untouched. These
were laid on their sides across the space, in the usual contracted or
doubled-up attitude. Mr. Bateman, in 1843, found in the more perfect
of the two Five Wells chambers the remains of about twelve skeletons,
all in a state of confusion. He also found a similar number in one
of the Ringham-low[7] chambers, and in that at Smerrill, and a still
greater number at Stoney-low.[8] The chambers at Mininglow and
Greenlow had been too much rifled to yield more than a few scattered
bones to his spade. In the Wardlow barrow seventeen skeletons were
found, “inclosed by two side walls”; and from that on Derwent Moor a
“cartload of human bones occupied a large trench above a yard wide.”
The skulls in every case, when sufficiently perfect for their form to
be made out, have been of the long or dolichocephalic shape; and all
the shin bones that have come under the writer’s notice have exhibited
the peculiar flattening known as platycnemism. These Neolithic people
had a remarkable immunity from dental caries, although the teeth are
frequently so worn down by mastication that they must have been almost
level with the gums in life. Out of 148 teeth at Harborough Rocks, many
of which were excessively ground down, there were only five or six
which showed any signs of caries.
[7] _Ten Years’ Diggings_, 93.
[8] _Vestiges_, 46.
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