EARLY MAN 



direction for many miles. The name Icknield Street may indicate that 

 it was the main road to the country of the Iceni. 



PILE DWELLINGS 



Remains of ancient pile-dwellings, probably belonging to pre- 

 historic times, have been found in the county, principally in the 

 neighbourhood of Newbury. As Newbury was the centre of a lake- 

 district, as is evident from its peat-deposits, such a mode of building is 

 natural. 



Further evidence suggestive of ancient dwellings was found in 

 1870,' when, in digging in Fence Wood, near Hermitage, a kind of 

 pyramidal dwelling beneath the ground was discovered. The roof was 

 covered with clay about i foot in thickness, and was supported by a large 

 piece of timber about 26 feet long. The dwelling appears to have been 

 constructed in what had originally been a lake or morass, and which 

 had in time become covered by a deposit of peat, and at a depth of 

 from 15 to 1 6 feet were found three causeways by which the dwelling 

 had formerly been approached. Unfortunately the remains were too 

 much damaged by the inrush of water for any careful examination of 

 the site to be made. 



In Newbury a a good many traces of pile-dwellings were discovered 

 during the drainage operations in 1894. In Bartholomew Street, 

 Market Place, and Cheap Street were found underground pile-structures, 

 consisting for the most part of solid balks of unbarked oak, roughly 

 hewn, with massive beams crossing from side to side and resting on 

 vertical piles. The piles were placed sometimes close together, some- 

 times in pairs, and sometimes tolerably far apart. In most instances 

 their tops were brought to a level, so as to support the beams of the 

 platform laid upon them. The vertical piles were roughly morticed 

 in order to receive the tenons of the cross-beams, a feature which may 

 point to the use of metallic tools in the work of constructing the 

 dwellings. 



Generally speaking, the Newbury pile-dwellings were more 

 numerous on the southern side of the river than on the northern, and 

 their situation was found to vary considerably in relation to the present 

 course of the Kennet. In prehistoric times, however, the site of New- 

 bury was occupied by a lake or morass. 



In the peat at about 7 feet from the surface in Bartholomew Street, 

 opposite the Coopers' Arms, a platform of fir poles, about 5 inches in 

 diameter and about 1 8 inches apart, was met with. The stakes, which 

 were rudely pointed, had been firmly driven into the peat. The 

 antiquities found in the peat comprise numerous flint implements of 

 characteristic neolithic types, as well as bones of the horse, pig, goat, 

 red-deer, dog, wolf, marten, short-horned ox (bos taurus, var. longi- 

 frons), bear, boar, beaver, etc. 



1 Trans. Newbury Dist. Field Club, i. 123. 2 Ibid. iv. 206-8. 



I 193 25 



