ANCIENT BURYING PLACES.
The remains next under consideration are the cairns or burial mounds. These have been very numerous on the high grounds and unenclosed moors around the source of the Lyvennet. Thirty or forty may still be found perched upon the highest peaks, or otherwise on commanding situations, others on the overhanging banks of the streams, while some have been placed without any characteristic choice of site. Some of these bear significant names or more often the name is applied to an extended area of the hill or plain on which they are found; and others there are with which no name can be connected. The word How, Danish—a hill, is generally significant of a mound, but is often applied to the whole, as Sill How, Raise How, Bousfield How, How Arcles, How Neuk and How Robin; on each of which are mounds. Raise is an older word of similar meaning, and is applied more directly to a mound, as Raise How on Bank Moor. This name is more common in the neighbourhood of Shap. Pen, of Cambro-Celtic origin, having the same meaning, is found in Penhurrock. Others again bear the ordinary name of Hill, as Iren Hill, Round Hill, &c. Though these mounds have been raised by different people each in their day, yet they are often found to have been named or rather called Hills by whatever word in the language or dialect of the succeeding races expressed the same. Others again there are bearing names peculiar to themselves, as Iren Hill, Sill How, Hollinstump, Penhurrock, Robin Hood's Grave, Lady's Mound, &c. Though they are numerous, yet many of them have been opened by the hill-breakers of the last century, or been more or less ravaged for the sake of stones, earth, &c.; for this reason it is difficult to distinguish those belonging to different ages, though it is highly probable the great majority are British.
On Gaythorn Plains—an extensive tract of comparatively level moor on the north side of Orton Scar, are two mounds 100 yards apart, respectively fourteen and [ ] yards in diameter; the larger of these, on being opened by Rev. J. Holmes, was found to contain in the centre an urn of baked clay, ornamented with rude zig-zag work on the outside; this was broken but had contained ashes; besides this the mound contained remains of five different skeletons which, from the wear of the teeth, had been of different ages; some being sharp and pointed, while others were worn quite flat. It is a remarkable fact that no teeth found in any mounds show the slightest symptoms of decay.
At the extreme edge of the Plains on the brow of a cliff overlooking Sale Bottom is another mound composed solely of stones; it is twenty-six yards in diameter, and has originally been about seven or eight feet high. It is known as Hollinstump, a corruption, as some think, of Llewellen's Tomb. Llewellen was the last of the Welsh Kings, and was beheaded about 1280 in the reign of Edward I., but it is improbable the King would trouble to send his mangled remains for interment to such a distant part. It was opened by some gainseeking hill-breakers, who say they found a large slab of sandstone, under which was a full length skeleton and a small implement—in the words of the finder:—"He seemed t'eve been buried in his cleayse wid a jack-a-legs knife in his waistcwoat pocket." Of the sandstone slab:—"They brak it up an' gat three carfull o't finest sand et iver was carried to Appleby Low Brewery." Bone dust was not then come into fashion, or else we may be certain his bones would have been sold to the crushing mill. This place is said to be haunted, the apparition being a headless horseman who dashes along at a furious yet noiseless speed. Those who have seen him describe him as having in place of a head something like a blaze of fire, and others like a backboard laid upon his shoulders—perhaps the distinguished spirit of the wronged and headless Welsh King, whose sole revenge is to dash on the midnight wind around his tomb, to the terror and dismay of each benighted wanderer.
Round Hill near Towcett, was opened by a similar class, out of which was got a sandstone slab of large size, afterwards made into a chimney-piece; under it were also found human bones. A like one existed at Flatt Neuk on Bank Moor, but is now removed; within it was a cist formed of rude stones set up edgewise, in which was the skeleton, and alongside a bronze spear-head; this cist was covered by a large sandstone slab, over which had been heaped, as in the others mentioned, earth and stones even to hundreds of cartloads in quantity; in some cases brought from a large distance.
Penhurrock, the highest point by the road leading from Crosby to Orton, was a large mound of stones, but it has been removed and broken up for road metal, with the exception of a few boulders of granite. Its diameter was about twenty yards, having in the centre a cist surrounded by an irregular circle of stones about eleven yards across; the boulders are only very small, and have been covered up in the mound. A quantity of bones was found, some of them of gigantic proportions: and what is rather curious, in a small cavity on one side were found a quantity of ashes, remains of the fire by which the bodies had been consumed. As no account was kept of the deposition of its contents, in what position the entire skeletons were found, or where the ashes of those consumed had been placed, we can form no decided opinion respecting its age; but from its mixed contents it was probably used as a burial place by different succeeding races.