ANGLO-SAXON REMAINS 



head or shoulder, and were probably placed in the grave to contain food or 

 drink for the dead, 8 though they may also represent the cinerary urns of the 

 pagan period. 



One skeleton was found without the skull, and the upper part of another 

 was wanting. This may be due to subsequent disturbance (and there seems 

 to have been much rubbish buried on this site), but such occurrences are not 

 uncommon, 9 and may be due to the fortune of war, stray skulls being 

 included in several graves at Mitcham, Surrey. Nor are flexed skeletons 

 peculiar to this cemetery ; slight contraction of the lower limbs was noticed 

 in five cases ; but such was the general rule in the extensive cemetery at Slea- 

 ford, Lines., and many casual instances are recorded 10 both in England and 

 across the Channel. 



Bronze was comparatively scarce, but besides the objects already 

 mentioned was a ring-brooch from a child's grave, which also contained 

 beads and a coin of Constantine (struck in 327) pierced for use as a pendant. 

 A pair of tweezers was found with another skeleton, the customary knife in 

 this instance being still in its sheath ; one cinerary urn contained an engraved 

 spindle-whorl made of deer-horn, and inside another, with cremated bones, 

 were several beads and part of a thin bronze disc, which was doubtless the 

 base of a brooch of the ' applied ' variety, the position of the pin-head and 

 catch being distinguishable on one side. The type is practically confined to 

 England, a late Roman specimen from Sigy, near Neufchatel (Seine- 

 inferieure), 11 giving some clue to its origin : the principal site is the ceme- 

 tery at Kempston, Beds., but all were there found in association with 

 skeletons. 12 It is noteworthy that the same cemetery produced a trefoil- 

 headed brooch almost identical with that from Stapenhill, and what seems 

 to be the prototype of the equal-armed brooch here illustrated (fig. i). 

 The latter closely resembles one from Cambridgeshire, but the type is 

 rare in England, and only a few specimens are known abroad. This 

 equal-armed brooch differs widely from that found in southern France, 

 and probably reached England and southern Scandinavia from the neigh- 

 bourhood of Hanover, where elaborate examples of earlier date are 

 comparatively common. And it is remarkable that the fifth-century 

 specimens in England outnumber those of the sixth, which are plain and 

 common-place as that from Stapenhill. The evolution of this type has 

 been briefly indicated by Dr. Bernhard Salin, who illustrates the specimens 

 mentioned above. 133 



Both at Stapenhill and Kempston were found coins of the Constantine 

 period, pierced for suspension, and tubular ' beads ' of bronze. Further, the 

 cinerary urns and accessory vessels are of the same types, and both cemeteries 

 contained cremations as well as inhumations. Partial cremation was also 



8 Pottery vessels were included in coffins of the Middle Ages: Arch, xxxvii, 417. 



* White Horse Hill, Berks. (Crania Britannica, pt. ii) ; E. Yorkshire (Mortimer, Thirty Tears' Researches, 

 pp. xxxiii, xxxvi, 321) ; Mitcham, Surrey (Arch. Ix, 53, 57). 



10 Sleaford, Arch. 1, 385 ; other instances in E. Yorks. ; Kempston, Beds. ; Marston St. Lawrence, 

 Northants ; Leagrave, Beds. Cf. Cochet, Normandie Souterraine (ed. 2), 218. 



11 Proc. Soc. Antij. Land. (Ser. l), iv, 237. 



11 V.C.H. Beds, i, 180 (figs, n and 13 on plate) ; other brooches referred to are fig. 2 on plate, and 

 ' engraved bronze brooch ' on p. 1 79. 



u * Die A Itgermaniiche Thlenrnamentik, 74, figs. 1 74, 1 76, 699, &c. 



203 



