258 EXCAVATIONS AT MATJMBURY RINGS. 



Close inspection revealed some artificial scoring of the E. side 

 of the recess ; and on the W. side, close to the top, a star, thus 

 * , the rays about fin. across, was distinctly scored ; near it 

 again a number of meaningless vertical and oblique lines, 

 and also XI in characters fin. high. Casts of each of these 

 features were taken. These signs appear to have been 

 scratched with a knife or sharp flint, much in the way that a 

 boy will cut marks in any long exposed face of chalk at 

 the present day. 



In front of the S.S.W. part of the platform a circular 

 post-hole pierced the solid sloping side of what appeared to be 

 the top of a shaft, to the extent of l'2ft., and it was 0'4ft. 

 in diameter on the face of the rock. In removing the silting 

 across the cutting, N.E. to S.W., the outline of nine other 

 circular post-holes was clearly traced, but nothing of archaeo- 

 logical value was found in either of them ; they varied 

 from Sin. to Gin. in diameter. In clearing the top of one of 

 them against the base of the wall, another iron cleat (No. 231) 

 was discovered (Fig. 3). 



Very few relics were found in clearing out the rubble, but 

 pottery of the Romano-British period, including fragments of 

 British type and three pieces of red Samian ware, were col- 

 lected ; also eleven iron nails. Just above the chalk rubble, 

 in mixed silting, a bone pin (No. 224, Fig. 4), and part of a 

 human thigh-bone (No. 228) were found. 



In one large patch in the E.N.E. part of the cutting, in chalk 

 rubble and apparently just below the Roman deposits, a 

 quantity of wood was found, upon which Mr. Reid reports as 

 follows : " This wood is oak, blackened as fossil oak usually is, 

 but I do not think charred ; at any rate, it is not well 

 burnt charcoal." 



Having removed the Roman deposits across the middle of 

 the cutting, we proceeded to ascertain the nature and extent 

 of the arena-floor and inner trench at the foot of the 

 seventeenth century terrace. 



The gangway, a ridge of chalk with flat top, but of irregular 

 outline on the W., owing to the existence of the shafts, 



