PARISH OF CROSBY RAVENSWORTH. 397 



a crevice of the rock on Gaythorn Plain ; and at no great distance, 

 in a similar cleft on Orton Scar, a very fine and large silver fibula 

 and a torque (now in the Museum of the Society of Antiquaries) 

 were discovered 1 . At Harbyrn Bigg, a long and broad bronze 

 blade, of a form which has not uncommonly been met with in 

 Ireland, was found in draining. Near to a spring, a little to the 

 east of the village of Crosby Ravensworth, two of the curious and 

 enigmatical spoon-shaped bronze articles of the 'Late Keltic' period 

 were dug up; they are described and figured in an exhaustive 

 paper by the late Mr. Albert Way, in the Journal of the Eoyal 

 Archaeological Institute, vol. xxvi. p. 62. In connection with these 

 peculiar bronze articles, which have usually been found deposited 

 in pairs, it may be mentioned that on more than, one occasion they 

 have been met with near to springs of water. 



I examined three of the cairns still remaining, all of which 

 proved to have been disturbed by previous explorers. The two first 

 were situated on Gaythorn Plain, a tract of high land which 

 borders on the parish of Asby. 



CLXXX. One was 25 ft. in diameter, 2 ft. high, and had once 

 been surrounded at the base by a circle of stones, four of which (one 

 of them a granite boulder) still remained. At the centre, and laid 

 upon the natural surface, were the scattered and broken bones of 

 the unburnt body of an adult, which had been discovered and 

 displaced when the cairn had first been opened. 



CLXXX I. The second cairn was 34 ft. in diameter and 3 ft. high ; 

 like the first, it had once had a circle of stones round the base. At 

 a distance of 8^ ft. south-east of the centre, and placed If ft. above 

 the surface of the ground, was a cinerary urn containing the 

 burnt remains of an adult, probably a woman. The urn was so 

 much decayed that nothing beyond the fact that such a vessel 

 had once existed could be ascertained. At the centre and laid 

 upon the natural surface, which at the place was an outcrop of 

 limestone-rock rising a little above the surrounding ground-level, 

 were many broken and scattered bones, their condition being due 

 to a previous opening which had been made into the centre of 

 the cairn. They had belonged to two bodies, one an adult male, 

 the other probably a male and under twenty years of age. In 



1 Journ. of Arch. Inst., vol. ix. p. 90, where the fibula is engraved. 



