A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



fascinating, as is also his comparison of the ornament on a bronze 

 bucket with that on some GauUsh coins. Another discovery of great 

 import was that of the marsh village found near Glastonbury by 

 Mr. A. Bulleid in 1892. This proves to be the remains of habitations 

 belonging to the Late Celtic period ; they were built upon layers of 

 brushwood and timber, held in position by numbers of small piles, until 

 they were raised clear of the water. 



Prof Boyd Dawkins in his address to the Anthropological Section 

 of the British Association when it was held at Nottingham in 1893, 

 after giving a brief resume of the articles found in this marsh village, 

 concluded his address as follows : ' We may therefore fix with tolerable 

 certainty the age of these lake dwellers as being just before the time 

 that the Roman influence was felt directly in the west of England 

 and certainly before the Roman conquest. The discovery is most 

 important ; when fully worked out it will probably throw a flood of 

 light on the history of pre-Roman Britain.' The results of the ex- 

 cavations which have been carefully conducted by Mr. Bulleid are not 

 yet published. 



Not the least important addition to our gradually extending know- 

 ledge of this period is the fine series of articles which Northamptonshire 

 has yielded from the excavations of Hunsbury Camp during the years 

 1882 to 1884, for it is to the same Late Celtic period or Prehistoric 

 Iron age that the whole collection of remains found in the camp 

 belongs. This earthwork locally known as Danes' Camp is situated 

 towards the end, and on the highest part of a broad ridge of elevated 

 ground about two miles south-west of Northampton. It occupies a strong 

 position, commanding on the north-eastern side the valley of the Nene 

 and the rising ground on the northern side of the river as far as Earl's 

 Barton and Ecton. From that side of the camp which faces north and 

 on the north-western side extensive views are obtained over the country 

 towards Duston, Berrywood, Upton, Weedon, Blisworth, and as far as 

 Roade in the southerly direction. By the side of the camp is an ancient 

 trackway, which for about half a mile on either side is grass grown, and 

 forms the boundary between the parish of Hardingstone, in which the 

 camp is situated, and the parish of Wootton. 



This camp has been known to successive generations of antiquaries 

 since the days of Morton, who gave a short description of it in 

 his work on the Natural History and Antiquities of Northamptonshire, 

 published in 171 2. Morton considered it to be a summer camp of 

 the Danes, though he gives no very sound reason for his opinion ; 

 as he tells us in his quaint style : ' I attribute it to the Danes, the 

 rather because I see not to whom else it should belong.' Morton 

 apparently gave more credit to the Danes than the present school of 

 archaeologists does, for he attributed Rainsborough Camp also to them 

 as well as Borough Hill near Daventry. In bygone days both the 

 Devil and the Danes had a great many more things attributed to 

 them than they could justly claim. Near Driffield in Yorkshire, at 



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