EARLY MAN 



are so well made that it would be impossible to improve upon them in these 

 days, with all our modern appliances for working in metal. 



Market Bosworth has furnished one interesting relic of the Bronze Age 

 which has since unfortunately been allowed to fall to decay and is now lost. 

 This was an earthen pot with well-developed lip or rim ornamented with 

 parallel horizontal lines, a somewhat deeply depressed waist, and a rather 

 small body. In general character it closely resembled the regular Bronze 

 Age cinerary urn, although the proportionate sizes of its various parts would 

 cause it to be regarded as a somewhat clumsy and ill-shaped vessel. The 

 drawing upon which these remarks are based, however, may be not quite 

 accurate. Another feature which strikes one as somewhat unusual is the 

 series of punctures at regular intervals on the waist and at the top and 

 bottom edge of the rim. Here again, however, the artist may have added 

 details in a somewhat different way from the original. 



The pot or urn was discovered in the year 1849 in the grounds of the 

 rectory house at Market Bosworth during the work of grubbing up a hedge. 

 It was broken into a number of pieces, and afterwards deposited by the 

 Rev. N. P. Small in the museum at Leicester. In 1854, when the urn was 

 figured in the publications of the Anastatic Drawing Society, the fragments 

 could not be found. No particulars are forthcoming as to the size of the 

 urn, but the general form, as shown in the drawing, suggests a cinerary urn 

 of about lain, or 15 in. high. 



Pottery of the Bronze Age is not particularly abundant in Leicestershire. 

 It is probable that some has shared the fate of that found at Market Bosworth; 

 but there are a few interesting pieces in Leicester Museum. These include 

 a cinerary urn nearly 6 in. high, found at Aylestone Park ; an urn of red 

 earth, 4! in. high, probably a vessel belonging to the class known as incense- 

 cups, found at Mountsorrel ; a cinerary urn of the regular Bronze Age 

 type, i6jiti. high, found at the same place, and now in the museum at 

 Leicester ; and a cinerary urn 13 in. high, found at a barrow called Round 

 Hill, at Syston. In addition to these there were two vessels of pottery, 

 presumably of the Bronze Age, found at Noseley, and exhibited at a meeting 

 of the Leicestershire Archaeological Society in i863. 13 



THE EARLY IRON AGE 



This period, which may be said to commence with the introduction of 

 iron implements, utensils, and weapons in England, and to end with the 

 Roman invasion and occupation, is at once the latest and the most interesting 

 of the archaeological divisions of the prehistoric period. No definite date 

 can be ascribed to the beginning of the early Iron Age, because although it 

 is known to have commenced in central and western Europe at about the 

 same time, and possibly about five centuries before the Christian era, there 

 are no certain data upon which a precise opinion on the subject can be 

 formulated. In Britain, separated as it is from the European continent, it is 

 extremely likely that the knowledge of iron may have arrived somewhat 

 later than in other regions of western Europe. 



u See Trans, ii, 275. 

 171 



