Bronze Age Barrows

The barrows of this era in Derbyshire, as elsewhere, differ so much among themselves in form, size, construction, and contents, that it is impossible to establish a Bronze Age “type.” They have little in common, except in the relics associated with their interments, which have the impress of a common age. Compared with the chambered class, they are, as a rule, smaller and of less elaborate construction; but more marked is the difference in their internal arrangements. The former barrows suggest the idea that they were erected to receive the dead; these, that they were piled up over the dead. The chamber, being designed to receive successive interments, was provided with a tunnel-like gallery, or other means of more or less easy access; whereas the Bronze Age cist or grave, having received its charge, was permanently closed, and if the mound which was raised over it was used for future burials, new receptacles were made for the dead, which rarely interfered with the primary or original one. Sometimes, however, in digging a new grave the primary was reached, and more often than not the bones were thrown on one side to make way for the new interment, thus indicating how completely the Neolithic procedure had disappeared.

The results of the examination of about 250 of the Derbyshire Bronze Age barrows have been placed upon record, and these represent about three times as many interments which have been described—by “interment” must be understood, not the remains of each separate body buried, but each burial, whether it consisted of one body or more.

So far as can be judged from the usually worn down and mutilated condition of these Derbyshire barrows, the prevailing original form was that of a shallow dome or inverted bowl, but various transitions ending with the disc-shaped types of Dr. Thurnam occur. Their outlines are circular, unless rendered irregular by the addition of secondary mounds or the depredations of a still later age. Their usual diameters range between 30 and 60 feet, and the heights rarely exceed 6 feet; but these dimensions are occasionally less or greater. With few exceptions, the mounds are of stone, or of stone with an admixture of earth; but whether the latter is an original ingredient is often uncertain—it may be merely blown earth and vegetable mould. Broadly speaking, therefore, these Bronze Age barrows are cairns. In most instances they consist of such stones as may be gathered from the surface, simply thrown together. A slight advance upon this is the introduction of a kerb of larger stones to define the margin of the mound (fig. 6). In a further advance, the kerb is formed of one or more rings of large, flat stones set on edge in the ground and inclining inwards. In a still further advance, the whole mound may be built up of concentric rings of such inclined stones. The barrow on Grinlow[9] (on which the tower known as “Solomon’s Temple” stands), near Buxton, showed this construction (fig. 7). In the kerbed barrows, the partial removal of the looser materials of the central portion may result in a table-like mound, the kerb forming a well-marked shoulder; and if the destructive process has gone further, this may stand out verge-like—results which have been mistaken for original designs. Examples of all these are to be met with in Derbyshire.

These barrows, again, are sometimes surrounded with a bank or a ring of stones, or a combination of the two. That known as Hob Hurst’s House, on Baslow Moor,[10] is closely invested with an annular bank, and the writer has seen a similar example on Eyam Moor. In others, the bank is further away, and is usually capped or lined with a row of standing stones, a few feet or yards apart. There was formerly a good example of this variety on Abney Moor, and others on Eyam Moor with rings apparently of stones only. As the ring expanded, the enclosed mound seems to have been smaller, and consequently more easily removed by the accidents of time; and this probably explains the origin of the smaller so-called “Druidical” circles.[11]

Fig. 6.—Section of Barrow at Flaxdale, near Youlgreave.
(From wood-cut by Llewellynn Jewitt.)

Fig. 7.—Section of Barrow at Grinlow, near Buxton.

Fig. 8.—Plan of Burial at Thirkelow, near Buxton.

During the period we are considering, both inhumation and cremation were practised, sometimes together. The placing of the interments was as diverse as the forms and construction of the barrows. For the moment we will confine ourselves to the inhumated class. In the simplest mode of burial, the body was laid on the ground and the mound heaped over it. But often, perhaps usually, something was done to fence it in, or to protect it from the material of the mound. The simplest fence consisted of a row of stones placed round the body (as in the plan of the interment of a barrow at Thirkelow, near Buxton, fig. 8[12]), and between this and the symmetrical enclosure, formed of flag-stones set on edge, has been found every transition. When it was desired to protect the body from the weight of the mound above, a simple device was to place it at the foot of a large stone or a ledge of rock, against which flat stones were reared pent-wise over it; or large stones were made to incline against one another from opposite sides, like a gable roof. From these simple devices we pass through another series of transitions to the box-like cist, formed of slabs on end and roofed with others. Then there was burial in a grave, shallow or deep, large or small, simply filled up with earth or stones, or roofed with one or more flag-stones to form a vault; and the vault, when lined with other flag-stones, became an underground cist. Examples of all these modes of burial have been found in Derbyshire, where, from the abundance of stone, cists are numerous. We know that timber was used for like purposes where stone is scarce, and there is indirect evidence for its occasional use in this county.

What has been said above, will apply in some measure to the cremated interments. Occasionally these are found in cists, graves, and other receptacles, as large as those containing unburnt skeletons; but more frequently they are smaller and better proportioned to the small compass of the remains. Probably the larger receptacles relate to the early days of cremation, when it was a new fashion; to-day, by force of habit, we occasionally transfer the few handfuls of ashes from the crematorium to an ordinary coffin instead of an urn for burial. Generally speaking, however, the disposal of the cremated remains differed considerably from that of unburnt bodies. When the funeral pile was raised on the spot where the burial was to take place, it was the common custom to collect the calcined bones into a little heap on the surface, or to place them in a shallow depression made before or after the burning. In either case, they were sometimes deposited on a flat stone, and there is reason to think that they were often first tied up in a cloth or placed in a basket. This would be especially convenient when they had to be transferred to a different site for burial from that where the body was burned, as seems to have been more often the case in Derbyshire. A more notable receptacle for the burnt remains was the cinerary urn, which may be regarded as the equivalent of both the cloth or basket and of the cist. The urn was usually deposited in a simple hole, and most often, in this county, upright, the mouth being nearly always covered with a thin stone. When reversed, the mouth usually rested upon such a stone.

The regard of the Derbyshire Bronze people for their dead sometimes—and perhaps more often than we suspect—went beyond the mere provision of a protection from the surrounding soil or stones. Occasionally the receptacle was paved, or it contained gravel, clay, or fine earth or sand, on which the body was laid, or in which it was embedded. On Stanton and Hartle moors several cists containing cremated remains were filled with sand, which in one rested on a bed of heather.[13] In a grave at Shuttlestone,[14] near Parwich, the body had been wrapped in a skin, and laid upon a couch of fern leaves. In another, near King’s Sterndale,[15] there was tenacious clay mixed with grass and leaves, which still retained their greenness. The presence of these perishable substances, which under ordinary conditions must have soon disappeared, may represent a general custom.

The dead were evidently buried or cremated, as the case may have been, in their wearing apparel, for the pins, buttons, studs, weapons, and the like, which are frequently found with the unburnt remains, are often in the relative positions they would occupy on the attire; and in case of the burnt, they have almost invariably passed through the fiery ordeal.

Fig. 9.—Dolichocephalic Skull from “Chamber” at Harborough Rocks. Side and Top Views. (Scale = ⅓.)

Barrow burial in Derbyshire, as elsewhere, was not confined to one sex or to any particular age. The remains of women and children are found in graves and cists as carefully constructed and associated with implements and ornaments as varied and elaborate as those which appertain to the men, indicating, surely, that the family tie was strong, and that the lot of the women was not servile. The frequency with which an infant is associated with an adult, usually a woman, and presumably the mother, probably points to infanticide upon the demise of the parent. Similarly, the occasional presence of a woman’s remains with those of a man points to suttee. More frequently a deposit of cremated bones is associated with a skeleton, and this may possibly represent the sacrifice of a slave. These in themselves, however, do not necessarily indicate a state of savagery, as the recent prevalence of suttee in India and of infanticide in China sufficiently prove.

In the unburnt interments, the body was laid in a more or less contracted posture, varying from a slight flexure of the knees to such a doubling up as to bring them close to the chest, and nearly always on the side, very rarely sitting. The contracted posture may be said to be the invariable Bronze Age rule in Derbyshire, for the only exception—a skeleton laid at full length at Crosslow[16]—may possibly have belonged to a later period. The side on which the body was laid, and its orientation, have in themselves no apparent signification, and are irrespective of sex or age. To judge from the recorded instances, about as many were laid on the left side as the right. Their orientation shows a slight predilection for the south, and a more marked aversion to the north-west. The Rev. Dr. Greenwell pointed out many years ago[17] that in the majority of instances in the north of England which came under his notice, the bodies had been so placed as to face the sun during some part of the day, nearly 60 per cent. having their gaze confined to southerly directions between the south-west and the south-east. If we analyse the forty-four Derbyshire cases in which both the orientation and the side are given, we obtain a similar result—the faces of over 60 per cent. looking in directions ranging from west to south-east. It seems clear that no importance was attached to the direction of the body or the side upon which it was laid, except so far as these enabled it to face the source of light and life; but it was not a rule invariably insisted upon.

These skeletal remains throw an interesting light upon the contemporary inhabitants of Derbyshire. Unfortunately, when Bateman was so actively engaged in opening barrows, anthropology was in its infancy. He and his colleagues rarely gave more than the cephalic index and femoral length, and even these not always. The terms used in describing the skulls, as “boat-shaped,” “oval and elevated,” “medium,” “rather short,” “platycephalic,” “evenly rounded,” etc., do not admit of precise interpretation, and probably no exact value was attached to them. From all sources sufficient particulars of about 85 Bronze Age skulls found in Derbyshire are available to allow of the following classification:

Dolichocephalic skulls, approximately16
Mesaticephalic””25
Brachycephalic””44
—
85

This intermixture of skull-forms has long been observed in the barrows of this age elsewhere in the country, and is generally recognized as indicating the intrusion of a round-head people upon the Neolithic long-heads, the intermediate form being the result of intermarriage between the two stocks. The proportion of these different forms in Derbyshire is of peculiar interest, because, as the Rev. Dr. Greenwell pointed out in his British Barrows, the dolichocephalic and brachycephalic skulls are found in about equal numbers in the barrows of the wolds, whereas in those of the south-west of the island the latter very greatly preponderate. Hence, in Derbyshire, the ratio, like its geographical position, is roughly intermediate, and thus naturally confirms his conclusion, “that the earlier long-headed people were more completely eradicated by the intrusive round-heads in Wiltshire than they were in East Yorkshire.” The general experience has been that the brachycephalic skeletons indicate a race of more powerful physique than the people with whom they intermingled. Assuming that the length of the femur or thigh-bone is 27.5 per cent. of the stature in life, the average stature of twenty-one men was 5 ft. 7⅓ ins., and of seven women 5 ft. 0½ ins. The difference between these statures, nearly 7 ins., considerably exceeds that which obtains in England to-day, and must probably be set down to the effects of early child-bearing and hard work on a poor and irregular diet upon the Bronze women.

Fig. 10.—Brachycephalic Skull from Grinlow. Side and Top Views. (Scale = ⅓.)

The various objects associated with the interments have, as already stated, the impress of a common age. The most remarkable are the earthen vessels. Besides the cinerary urns referred to above, there were vessels of other forms, which have received the names of “drinking-cups,” “food-vases,” and “incense-cups.” The first two are with little doubt rightly named, as both in Derbyshire and elsewhere traces indicating the former presence of liquids and of solid foods have been detected in them respectively. The use of the diminutive “incense-cups” is unknown, and the name is a fanciful one. All these vessels are of clay, with an admixture of sand or crushed stone to prevent them cracking in the process of firing, and are shaped by hand and imperfectly burnt. The ornamentation is essentially of the same character in all, but it varies greatly in elaboration, consisting of various combinations of straight lines, produced for the most part by the impression of twisted thongs or rushes or of notched stamps, or, less frequently, of grooves made with a pointed tool. These combinations are extremely varied, consisting of simple bands of parallel lines, parallel lines in alternate series, horizontal and vertical, saltires, zig-zags, “herring-bone” and latticed diapers, etc. Punched dots and impressions of the finger-nail or tip also occur, but sparingly. The forms of the drinking-cups, food-vases, and cinerary urns are tolerably constant in Derbyshire, but the little incense-cups vary very much; these, too, are usually the most carefully made, while the urns are, as a rule, the coarsest and the least decorated. In figs. 11 and 12 are shown Derbyshire examples of each kind, which will convey a better idea of them than any description.

Fig. 11.—Typical Examples of Bronze Age Burial Vessels, Derbyshire.
A—Drinking-Cups. B—Food-Vases. (Scale = 1/5 size of originals.)

Flint implements, flakes, and fragments are the most frequent accompaniments. The implements include all the ordinary forms of the period: arrow, javelin and spear-heads, daggers, knives, scrapers, fabricators, and chisels, of every grade of workmanship down to nondescript-worked fragments of uncertain use. The majority of the flint objects are, however, mere shapeless fragments and chippings, and the frequent presence of these seems to indicate that the placing with the dead of things useful in life had already begun to degenerate into a merely symbolic ceremony.

Bronze objects follow next, but a long way behind. Of these the most numerous by far are knife-daggers, the rest consisting of awls, pins, axes, or celts, etc., and mere fragments. The first are of the early form, in which the blade was attached to the handle by two or three rivets, and the axes are of the early flat or slightly flanged form. Next come objects of bone and deer-horn; the former consisting mostly of pins and borers, and the latter of hammers. Then follow jet and Kimmeridge—coal beads, studs, and necklaces, several of these being of elaborate character. Besides the above, drilled and polished basalt and granite axe-hammers, whet-stones, rubbers, quartz pebbles, red ochre, and iron ore are occasionally met with. The animal remains associated with the interments are those of species still existing in Europe, and they include the present domesticated animals—the ox, sheep, goat, pig, horse, and dog. So frequently has a tooth, described as that of an ox or a horse, been reported that there is little doubt its introduction had some ceremonial import; perhaps, here again, it was a food offering reduced to a representative symbol.

Besides the various objects actually found with the interments, others often occur amongst the materials of the mounds. Some of these may have been unwittingly gathered up with the materials, and thus be of much greater age than the barrows in which they are found; others may have been casually dropped in after times, and have gravitated into the interior. But a more fertile source of the scattered objects is the disturbance of the earlier interments by the introduction of the later ones.

The objects described above fall into two, but not easily separated, classes—those which were introduced with the wearing apparel of the deceased, and those with ceremonial import. The vessels are a good example of the latter, as they differed in a marked degree from those used for domestic purposes. So also the animals’ bones, especially the teeth just referred to, as they evidently (as also the drinking-cups and food-vessels) imply offerings of food to the dead. The absence of Roman influence is noteworthy, as also is the absence of articles characteristic of the later Bronze Age, as swords, palstaves, and socketed axes. The objects indicate in the aggregate a time when stone implements were going out of use, and bronze was confined to a few light implements. But it must not be assumed in consequence that the barrows we are considering were confined to the earlier Bronze Age.

The remarkable differences in the mode of interment, which have been only sketchily described on the foregoing pages, present a highly interesting problem to be solved. The prevailing view is that these different modes were practised simultaneously by different tribes, and even by the same people. The double interments, in which an unburnt skeleton is associated with a deposit of cremated remains, may seem to countenance the latter view, while the distribution of the interments favours the former. For instance, in certain districts certain modes prevailed. On and around Stanton Moor, and throughout the country between Eyam, Castleton, and Sheffield, cremated interments predominate, while in many parts of the west of the county the interments are exclusively unburnt. Then, again, in barrows containing many burials there is a decided partiality for like rather than unlike interments. But if the phenomena are subjected to a careful and systematic study, it will be found that these differences are neither local nor tribal, but in the main consecutive.

The problem is solved by the superposition and other evidences of sequence of the different interments in those barrows which contain several, with the comparison of the associated objects, and then by a general correlation of the results derived from the individual barrows. It is by a similar process that the geologist establishes the sequence of his formations; the fossils playing the part of the associated objects. The pottery is a peculiarly valuable factor in the enquiry, as in spite of the conservatism of half-civilised people, the ease with which the plastic clay can be modelled into any desired shape resulted in comparatively rapid changes in form and decoration. In this respect the pottery contrasted with the flint and stone implements, the intractability of the materials of which limited the workman to a narrow range of forms; hence these forms continued unchanged through long periods. We will now give a few illustrations.

Fig. 12.—Typical Examples of Bronze Age Burial Vessels, Derbyshire.
A—Incense-Cups. B—Cinerary Urns. (Scale = 1/5 size of originals.)

In a barrow at Parcelly Hay[18] Mr. Bateman found a skeleton in a vault, and immediately above its cover-stones was another, accompanied with a bronze knife-dagger and a polished granite axe-hammer. Here is a case of simple superposition, in which the older interment was not disturbed by the later one. But frequently the later introduction disturbed or quite displaced the earlier. At Gray Cop,[19] near Monsal Dale, for instance, the original interment consisted of the skeletons of a woman and a child; but at a later date the cremated remains of another body had been buried so deeply that the woman’s pelvic bones had been dispersed in the process. The havoc wrought by the introduction of secondary interments is sometimes very confusing, and has given rise to erroneous conclusions on the part of the barrow-digger. In the two examples just cited, the earlier interment was the primary one—the one over which the mound was raised in the first instance—and it occupied the normal position, the centre of the site. The secondary interments may or may not be in the centre. In a small barrow at Lidlow,[20] near Youlgreave, for instance, the primary interment was a skeleton in a cist, while near the margin of the mound was a later deposit of burnt bones under a cinerary urn. In another at Blakelow[21] a central grave contained the skeletons of a woman and infant with a drinking-cup, while in a cist at a higher level near the edge were six more skeletons with a food-vase. In another on Hartle Moor[22] was a deposit of burnt bones with a food-vessel in the central cist, and near the margin a cinerary urn with its contents.

It has occasionally happened, however, that no central interment has been recorded. In some cases we may suspect that the explorers had forgotten that the primary interment is sometimes in a deep grave below the natural level. On the other hand, carelessness on the part of those who originally raised the mound may account for the interment being out of the centre. The same result has been brought about by additions to the original mound upon the occasions of new interments, for the Bronze folk were not always content with merely inserting these into an old mound. Sometimes the additional matter formed a capping. A barrow on Ballidon Moor[23] furnishes a good example of this; it had an inner cairn containing several interments, and was surmounted with a thick layer of earth, at the foot of which was an ashy stratum representing the site of a funeral pile, while in the earth above were the cremated remains derived from it. It was evident, therefore, that this capping was added on this occasion. More often the later mound was thrown up against the side of the old one. The smaller chambered cairn at Mininglow[24] was found to have had a mound of earth cast up against its side, and this had been raised over the spot where a man had been cremated, with whose remains were a bronze dagger, part of a bone implement, and some “good flints,” all of which had passed through the fire with their owner; and at Five Wells, Mr. Salt found a secondary interment of Bronze Age type, consisting of a contracted skeleton in a small cist, which had been constructed against the podium of the chambered cairn, and covered with stones and earth—two interesting proofs of the greater age of the chambered tumuli. These additions are not easily detected if their materials are similar to those of the parent mounds, but their effect may be apparent in the superficial irregularities they give rise to. Not a few Derbyshire examples could be given which probably owe their irregularities to this cause.

These illustrations will have given the reader an idea how the sequence of interments is determined. Many years ago the writer tabulated the sequences in all the Derbyshire (including the Staffordshire) barrows containing more than one interment each, of which reliable information was obtainable. When those associated with vessels, other than cinerary urns, were classified, some significant results were obtained. The distribution of the vessels was as follows:

Twenty-nine drinking-cups, all associated with unburnt interments;

Sixty-five food-vases, of which forty-eight were associated with unburnt and seventeen with burnt interments, but none of these in cinerary urns; and

Eleven incense-cups, all with burnt interments, and nearly all in cinerary urns.

It is a question whether the smaller food-vases associated with the burnt interments should not be classed as incense-cups, as the two forms often approximate; but this does not vitiate the general results.

That this table represents a sequence is proved by the fact that in no barrow containing a number of interments has one associated with a drinking-cup been found under conditions to suggest that it may have been of later introduction than a neighbouring food-vase or cinerary urn, nor is there an example of a food-vase interment succeeding an inurned one; whereas the contrary has frequently been noted.

If we apply the test of horizontal position, we find that, compared with the other interments, a much larger proportion of those with drinking-cups were central, while those in urns were as markedly lateral, indicating that the first were predominantly primary interments, and the last secondary. But the vertical position gives even more definite results. The normal position of a primary interment is on or below the old natural surface; that of a secondary, on or above that level.

The following table gives the percentages of these positions when ascertainable:—

Interments withBelow.On.Above natural level.
Drinking-cups83170
Food-vessels433126
Cinerary urns36.536.527

It will be observed that in descending order the proportion of those below the natural level decreases, and of those above increases, the inference being that the ratio of primary to secondary interments decreases.

These groups are further differentiated by the implements and other objects associated with them. These are, as a rule, more numerous in the drinking-cup interments and least so in the inurned. The flint implements of the former are usually the more carefully wrought. Two other peculiarities of the drinking-cup interments may be noted. With five of them was an instrument described as a mesh-rule or a modelling tool, made from the rib of some animal; but these instruments have not been found with other Bronze Age interments in the county. The other peculiarity is that in all these interments, the body, when it has been recorded, lay on its left side. Both these peculiarities are also characteristic of the drinking-cup interments of Staffordshire.

From these various data it is evident that very early in the Bronze Age inhumation was the normal mode of sepulture. The body, probably clad in the clothing of life, was laid on its side in a contracted attitude on the natural surface or in a grave, with or without a fencing or protection of some sort, which in its highest development took the form of a cist. Food was certainly often, if not invariably, placed with it; but all we know of this, as also any other articles which were present, are the less perishable portions that have survived the withering hand of Time—the bronze blade of a dagger-knife, the head of an axe, or the flint point of an arrow. Now and again a vessel of clay was also placed with the deceased—the vessel familiar to us as the “drinking-cup.” Later, but still early in the age, and while as yet the mode of burial was unchanged, this gave place to the food-vase. Whether this vessel was derived from the former is uncertain. Derbyshire provides no intermediate forms, and this seems to be general throughout the country. But the period of transition may have been short, and transitional forms may yet be forthcoming.

We have guardedly spoken of inhumation as the normal mode of sepulture at this early period, for cremation was both known and practised, perhaps from the very first. The occasional presence of a deposit of burnt human bones with these contracted interments has already been noticed. Whether, as was then suggested, it represents the immolation of a slave on the occasion of the burial or not, there is little doubt that it should be regarded as a subordinate feature, and the skeleton, as the interment proper. Fire certainly played an important part in these early funerals, as the frequent presence of a little charcoal indicates. Why? We can only guess. It must have had a religious import—the ceremonial purification of the grave, perhaps; and this might well have now and again included a human sacrifice.

There is little doubt that the drinking-cup was introduced from the Continent,[25] and one is tempted to connect its introduction with the brachycephalic newcomers, as also the introduction of bronze. The immigration seems to have been of a peaceful nature, and however much the powerfully-built “round-heads” may have influenced and even dominated the native population, they were numerically only a small element in it, and were ultimately—perhaps before the close of the Bronze Age—absorbed by it.

Before the food-vase ran its course, cremation, in the proper sense of the term, made its appearance, and soon became the general fashion. Perhaps it would be going too far to say that it supplanted inhumation. For anything we know to the contrary, the latter still continued in vogue in some parts of the country to the Roman period. At first, it would seem, the cremated remains were deposited in cists, or otherwise entombed after the manner of unburnt bodies; but soon the more appropriate cinerary urn made its appearance, as also the changeful and enigmatical little incense-cup. That the cinerary urn was derived from the food-vase is almost beyond doubt, for although Derbyshire has not supplied examples bridging the two, vessels of intermediate form and associated with burnt remains, but not containing them, have been found in the north.

Meanwhile, the objects placed with the dead became fewer and more meagre in character, until at length they were reduced to little more than fragments of flint, representing a rite, perhaps, with a lost meaning. Less care was expended on the sepulchral vessels as time went on, but the delicacy of some of the incense-cups proves that this was a rule with exceptions. The general trend of evidence goes to show that the later mounds raised over the dead were smaller and less stereotyped in form than those of old. Ringed barrows and the smaller “circles” are associated with cremated interments, especially those of the cinerary-urn stage, in Derbyshire.