PARISH OF EYFORD, GLOUCESTERSHIRE. 519 



end the chamber was 2 ft. 8 in. wide, and it continued of that 

 width for a distance of 3 ft. 8 in., when it increased to a width of 

 5 ft. 5 in. ; the total length being 7 ft. 8 in. It was 1^ ft. deep, 

 and was flagged on the bottom, the stones being placed on the 

 original surface of the ground. In consequence of the disturbance 

 to which the barrow had been subjected, it is impossible to say 

 how the chamber had been roofed in. Within it were found the 

 remains of ten bodies 1 , three being those of women, and all, with 

 the exception of one (that of a boy or girl of eleven or twelve 

 years of age), above the age of puberty. Close in front of 

 the neck of one of the bodies, that of a woman, placed at the 

 south-west corner of the chamber, was a bead, probably of Kim- 

 meridge shale or similar substance [fig. 162] : as the bones of 



Fig. 162. i. 



another body were intermixed with those of the woman, it is not 

 possible to say with certainty that the bead had been buried with 

 her, though the probability is strongly in favour of such being the 

 case. The bead is slightly oval in outline and much flattened, 

 the perforation has been made from both ends, and is very wide, 

 having no doubt been made with a flint borer. The whole of the 

 bones of these bodies were so broken and mixed up, both on ac- 

 count of their having been originally laid very close together and 

 from their having become crushed by the pressure of the stones 

 lying upon them, that it is difficult to say whether any one of 

 them had been interred in its entirety. There can be no doubt 

 that some of the bones had been held together by their ligaments 

 when they were deposited in the chamber, because they were found 

 in their proper relative juxtaposition, but in no case could it be 

 said that a complete body had been buried. The appearances 

 presented seemed to indicate that bodies, which had been pre- 

 viously interred elsewhere, had been afterwards brought, when the 

 flesh and other softer parts had become decayed, and re-interred, 



1 A full description of the bones, with some details of the way in which they 

 occurred, will be found in Professor Eolleston's paper before referred to, p. 160. 



