PARISH OP UPPER SWELLj GLOUCESTERSHIRE. 523 



what has been called a bee-hive roof. The chamber remained ac- 

 cessible for several years, and during that time many of the bones 

 were carried off. In clearing- it out completely in 1874 we found 

 that at least nine bodies had been buried within it, portions of as 

 many being still left, together with some bones of goat or sheep, 

 ox and pig, and two small pieces of plain pottery, all probably 

 belonging to the time when the interments had taken place. The 

 passage, however, had escaped rifling, and the almost perfect skele- 

 ton of a man, about thirty years of age, was discovered, whose 

 head, laid to S.W. by S., was about 1^^ ft. from the entrance into 

 the chamber. He had been placed, in a very contracted position, 

 on the left side, having the right hand up to the face, and the left 

 at the elbow of the right arm. Underneath the lower part of 

 his back was the skeleton of a child, about two or three years of 

 age, with the head to N., and having the bones of the upper part 

 of the body in their proper order. Close to the child's head was 

 the arm bone of a woman, from eighteen to twenty-four years of 

 age, of whose skeleton the lower vertebrae and pelvic bones 

 were in situ. Other of her bones, together with some bones of 

 goat or sheep and the jaw of a young pig, were lying about 

 in a disturbed condition. Thus it appears that in the first in- 

 stance a woman and a child had been buried in the passage, and 

 that afterwards the man's body had been interred there, during 

 which process some portions of the previously buried bodies had 

 become displaced. 



As belonging to the first formation of the barrow, the following 

 objects may be noted : a piece of plain pottery, found 6 ft. deep 

 between two of the before-mentioned transverse walls, and a piece 

 of red-deer's antler, showing signs of having been cut, met with 

 amongst the small stones and clay there forming the material of 

 the barrow, about 6 ft. south of the end of the chamber, and near 

 the south side of the mound. 



Some burials of a much later date than that of the construction 

 of the barrow were discovered, and also a vessel of pottery, which 

 possibly at one time accompanied a body now totally gone to 

 decay. It was found just over the facing of the north ' horn,' 

 near to its eastern extremity, and not much below the present sur- 

 face of the mound. It is somewhat of the ' drinking cup ' type, 

 4 in. high, 4| in. wide at the mouth, and 2\ in, at the bottom, and 

 ornamented over the whole surface with lines forming no distinct 

 pattern. On the upper part of the vessel these have been made 



