[241]This camp was probably, since coins of Claudius have been found there, occupied by Vespasian, when he conquered the Isle of Wight. A bronze celt was found here some eighty years ago, and came into the possession of Warner. Others have been discovered, in great quantities, in various parts of the Forest, two of which are engraved in Archæologia, vol. v., plate viii., figs. 9 and 10. Brander, too, the well-known antiquary, found others at Hinton, on the west border of the Forest (Archæologia, vol. v. p. 115). Mr. Drayson has also picked up two flint knives at Eyeworth, which are figured, showing both the under and upper surfaces, at [p. 206].
[242]As in Derbyshire all barrows are marked by the terminal low—hlœw, a grave, so in the Forest they seem particularized by a reference to the Old-English lic. Thus, near the Beaulieu barrows we find Lytton Copse and Common, and at the west end of the Forest, not far from Amberwood, meet another Latchmoor. I may notice that just outside the Forest, in Darrat’s Lane—a word which often occurs—we find a place, near some mounds, called “Brands,” equivalent to the “Brund” of Derbyshire, and having reference to the burning funeral pyre. (See Bateman’s Ten Years’ Diggings, Appendix, p. 290.)
[243]I certainly think that these urns were fired, though imperfectly. As Mr. Bateman remarks, sun-baked specimens soon return to their original clay. See Appendix to Ten Years’ Diggings, p. 280.
These three urns, with all the other fragments of cinerary vessels found in the Forest, I have placed in the British Museum, where they have been restored. The artist has represented them exactly as they appeared on the second day of digging. The fractures in the central urn were caused by an unlucky blow from a pick-axe. The measurements are as follows:—
| The north-eastern urn— | Circumference at | top | 3 ft. |
| ” | ” | bottom | 1 ” 6 in. |
| ” | Total height | 1 ” 4½ ” | |
| The central urn—The same. | |||
| The south-western urn— | Circumference at | top | 2 ” 9 ” |
| ” | ” | bottom | 1 ” 4½ ” |
| ” | Total height | 1 ” 1¼ ” | |
[244]I am inclined to think that here, as in the similar instance on Fritham Plain, the urns were put in the mound entire, and not, as is sometimes the case, in fragments. The pieces had no appearance of being burnt after the fractures had taken place, which were here simply the result of decay. See on this point Bateman’s Ten Years’ Diggings, pp. 191, 192, where Mr. Keller’s letter to Sir Henry Ellis on the subject is given.
[245]Instances have been known where the top of a Roman cinerary urn has been taken off, and replaced; but, from the narrowness of the neck, I hardly think this vessel was used for such a purpose. I give with it also a late British urn found, some twenty years ago, in a barrow outside the present Forest boundary, in a field known as Hilly Accombs, near Darrat’s Lane, which has been previously mentioned. It measures 6 inches in height, and has a circumference of 1 foot 9 inches round the top, and 1 foot at the base. With it was discovered another, but I have been unable to learn in whose possession it now is, or what has become of the Roman glass unguent bottle found in Denney Walk (see the Antiquities of the Priory of Christchurch, by B. Ferrey and E. W. Brayley, p. 2, foot-note). The two flint knives were discovered by Mr. Drayson, near Eyeworth Wood, and somewhat resemble the chipping found in the largest barrow at Bratley, and were, perhaps, cotemporary. The conchoidal fracture may be well seen in specimen on the right-hand side. The celts found by Warner and Brander, with others in the possession of Gough, mentioned at [p. 199], foot-note, were bronze.
[246]There are two large heathy tracts known as Fritham Plain; the one to the east, where stand several large trenched barrows, which still remain to be opened; and the West Plain, where these excavations took place.
[247]An attempt to examine this barrow had been previously made, but the explorers had opened a little to the south-west of the spot where the pottery lay. It is just possible that the large square in Sloden may be of the same character. I cut a small opening at the western end, but it is impossible, on account of the trees, to make any satisfactory excavation. Whatever might have been its original purpose, it was certainly never the site of a church, as is commonly supposed. See ch. iii., [p. 32], foot-note.
[248]To assist the archæologist, I have marked on the map the sites of all the barrows of which I am aware. In the British Museum is a small urn, found in a barrow at Broughton, on the borders of Hampshire, about twelve miles north of the Forest, measuring three inches in height, and, though so much less, somewhat resembling, with its two small ears, as also in the general character and texture of its ware, those found in the Bratley barrow. The Rev. J. Compton also informs me that some years ago a plain urn was discovered in a barrow on his father’s property at Minestead, in the Forest. I hear, too, that other urns have been found in barrows near Burley on the west, and near Butt’s Ash Lane on the east side of the Forest, but they have long ago been lost or destroyed, and I am unable to learn even their general form. I trust, therefore, permission will not be granted to open the mounds which are unexplored, except to those who can produce some credentials that they are fitted for the task, and are doing it from no idle curiosity, but legitimate motives. Too much harm has been already done, and too many barrows have been already rifled, without any record being made of their contents. Nearly all that we know of Kelt or Old-English we learn from their deaths. Their history is buried in their graves.