68 PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 



left in the well-known King Arthur's Cave and Banner- 

 man's Hole on the Wye, the deep gorge between 

 Symond's Yat and the Great Doward has been excavated,* 

 and that both caverns " are mere fragments and vestiges 

 " of limestone fissures which were once much longer, 

 " and have been worn away at their northern extremities 

 "and degraded by the atmospheric denudation of ages."t 

 In other caves, the nature and position of the deposits 

 above the buried implements of human manufacture also 

 indicate the prolonged action of eroding forces. It is 

 obvious that the soft Jurassic rocks of the Cotteswolds 

 have oftered far less resistance to denudation than have 

 the Mountain Limestone of the Wye gorge and other 

 hard rocks in which alone caverns containing the remains 

 of Cave men occur; and any Cotteswold caverns which 

 existed in the Cave period have undoubtedly been 

 destroyed in the scooping out of the river valleys. 



TYPES OF TUMULI 



The evidence of the occupation of the Middle Cottes- 

 Vk/olds in the Neolithic or Neanihroj)ic age is abundant 

 and varied. Ty{)ical of long tumuli are those in West 

 Wood, near Birdlip ; the prominent one on Shurdington 

 Hill; Belas Knap[), in the parish of Charlton Abbotts; 

 and others at Notgrove and Stow-on-the-Wold. Although 

 they vary in the number and position of the chambers or 

 cists in which the bodies were placed, they are l)uilt to 

 one general design. A dry wall of stone determines the 

 shape, and at one end curves inwards, giving the peculiar 

 horned appearance which is characteristic of long barrows, 

 and is, the late Professor Rolleston| said, strikingly 



" Records of the Rocks," j) 353. 

 t " The Severn Straits," p. 37. 

 J 'I'rans Bris. and Glou. ArcliKo. See, Vol. v., ji. 210. 



