66 Stonehenge and its Barrows. 



"Men who are employed in digging for flints on the downs, 

 always find the coins and various objects of antiquity at the bottom 

 of the soil. An interesting example of this occurred when the late 

 Mr. Waite invited me (now many years ago) to a Roman coin-hunt 

 on Broad Hinton down. We found eighteen good Roman coins in 

 the course of the morning. The process was a very simple one — 

 the men turned over the turf and adhering soil (in this case about 

 nine inches in depth) , and we found the coins on the under side, or 

 on the chalk rubble below. 



" Chippings of the ' blue stones/ i.e., of the stones of the inner 

 circle, have been found in three of the barrows near Stonehenge, 

 viz., in No. 16, No. ...} and in No. 42.^ They have also been 

 found, as stated by Sir R. C. Hoare, in the waggon-tracks round the 

 area of the temple.^ 



" Could it be clearly proved that these were associated in a baiTOW 

 with the original interment, no doubt would remain that Stonehenge 

 was older than the barrow.* Sir R. C. Hoare evidently considered 

 this to have been the case with regard to barrow No. 16, and Mr. 

 Cunnington, of Heytesbury, was of the same opinion, as is shewn 

 by the quotation from one of his letters, of which you have a copy. 

 [' I showed you,-* writes Mr. Cunnington, F.S.A., in 1802, 'a great 

 variety of stones found in a large oblong barrow near Stonehenge, 

 that are of the same kind as several of those in the building.^] 

 It is much to be regretted that the details as to the finding of these 

 fragments were not more explicitly stated. It should have been 

 distinctly noted whether they were found with the primary inter- 

 ment, as it is possible they may have reached the spot where they 



'Note by Mr. Cunnington. — "The fine bell- shaped barrow N.E. of Stone- 

 henge."— Hoare's Ancient Wilts, p. 127. [ ? No. 30.— IF.i.] 



''^oteby Mr. Cunnington. — Barrow No. 42 is nearly a mile in a straight 

 line from Stonehenge. [The discovery of blue stone chippings in No. 42 waa 

 made by Mr. H. Cunnington. — TF.i.] 



'Ancient Wilts, vol. 1., p. 127. 



*Note by Mr. Cunnington. — The barrow itself would be classified by Dr. 

 Thurnam with the round barrows — the " bronze period." Stukeley, who 

 describes it as "a very great and old-fashioned barrow," found in it, he says, 

 " fragments of the red and blue stones." 



