ANCIENT BRITISH DWELLINGS.

e have, says Sir Richard Colt Hoare, in his Ancient Wiltshire, "undoubted proof from history, and from existing remains, that the earliest habitations were pits, or slight excavations in the ground, covered and protected from the inclemency of the weather by boughs of trees or sods of turf." These dwellings usually formed villages, conveniently situated near streams or rivers, the habitations of the lords of the soil before the Roman occupation. Amongst the moorlands and wilds of Yorkshire, in spots where the spade and plough have not been in operation, upwards of forty British villages were described and inspected by Dr. Young, of Whitby. Many early dwellings are likewise to be met with in other parts of England; some sunk in the chalk, where cultivation has not entirely obliterated them, which is the case in the eastern counties. The large tumuli and barrows which remain, pertain to a much later era of our history; generally to the Roman and Saxon periods, when the use of bronze and iron became known.[87]

At a recent meeting of the Norwich Archæological Society, the members made an excursion to Brandon and neighbourhood, and at Grime's Graves Mr. Manning read a paper on the Graves, in which he maintained that this irregularly-shaped cluster of holes are ancient British dwellings, forming the remains of an ancient town. Each hole was lined with a layer of stones, and, when inhabited, roofed over with boughs or grass. The term "graves" means pits or holes, and the name "Grime's" was probably derived from "Græme," the Saxon for witch, or rather for anything supernatural. Thus the term "Grime's Graves" meant "Witches' Work." After leaving Grime's Graves, the party examined the Devil's Dyke, a long and extensive fosse and bank, supposed to have been made by the Ancient Britons for military purposes.