374 



YORKSHIRE. WEST RIDING. 



clearly been in use at the same time. The association of the bronze 

 awl with a ' drinking cup ' is also paralleled in one of the Rudstone 

 barrows, and the subsequent disturbance of the mound in order to 

 insert in it secondary burials, apparently of tlie same people as 

 those over whom it was first erected, is a matter of no infrequent 

 occurrence. 



PARISH OF RYLSTON. Ord. Map. xcn. N.W. 



The district of Craven in the West Riding- of Yorkshire, in 

 which the barrow now about to be described is situated, is one 

 abounding 1 in various remains of pre-historic times. Discoveries of 

 stone and bronze weapons and implements have occurred from time 

 to time in the immediate neighbourhood of the barrow, and other 

 sepulchral mounds still exist, some of which yet remain unopened, 

 but the greater number have been more or less destroyed by 

 curiosity-hunters, without any note of their construction or contents 

 having been preserved. 



There are also abundant examples of those peculiar terraces which, 

 formed on the slope of hill-sides, were at one time supposed to mark 

 the ancient levels of water, but which are notwithstanding clearly 

 of artificial origin. The most common explanation of them, one 

 indeed which has obtained almost general acceptance, is that they 

 are terraces made in the processes of cultivation. It is not very 

 easy to understand why such elaborate works, calling for no slight 

 expenditure of labour, should have been constructed to aid the 

 growth of any crop ; for though in some cases, where they occur 

 upon a steep hill-side, they might be needed to prevent the washing 

 away of the soil when it was broken up and therefore more subject 

 to the action of water, in other cases they are found upon slopes 

 lying at such an angle as obviously to preclude the necessity for 

 such a provision. They have been compared to the vine-terraces in 

 Rhine-land, and it has been supposed that soil was artificially 

 collected upon them as it is there, though I have never myself seen 

 any indications of such a method having been practised. They are 

 met with spread over a very wide area. I have noticed them in the 

 East Riding, in Westmoreland (where, near Kirby Stephen, they 

 cover large tracts of ground), in Durham, and Northumberland. 

 Indeed, in the county last named some of them are found, on the 

 precipitous sides of the porphyritic hills on the banks of the river 

 Brearaish, at such an elevation as to make it difficult to believe that 



