606 EXCAVATIONS IN AN ANCIENT 



Mr. Kemble, in the passages already referred to \ supposes that in 

 the transition state from heathenism to Christianity, such practices 

 as this may have been stealthily indulged in by the newly-made 

 and only half-converted proselytes, and these interments lend a 

 considerable confirmation to this view. The Abbe Cochet ^ and 

 Professor SchaafFhausen ^ seem to incline towards supposing that 

 the similar appearances which they have noticed are to be ascribed 

 to the remnants of a coffin ; but I am inclined to think that the 

 absence of nails, the raised position of the head observed in some 

 of these burials, the large size of, and the retention of a certain 

 brilliancy by, the fragments of carbonaceous matter found in these 

 graves, and underneath as well as around the skeletons, as well as 

 the conditions of reddening and of position which the stones 

 present, are points militating very strongly against the hypothesis 

 of a coffin having been present, and in favour of a wood fire having 

 been lighted in the grave either in preparation for, or for the 

 partial combustion of, the dead body- No coins were found in such 

 relations with the head or chest of any of these skeletons as to 

 make it seem likely that they had been put in as ' portoria ; ' in 

 one case, however, a. coin was found perforated, for suspension, 

 doubtless as an ornament, about the region of what had been the 

 chest or waist of a very much water-worn skeleton. Shards and 

 flints, and a few bones and teeth of domestic animals, were found 

 in these as in other kinds of inhumation observed in this cemetery. 

 In one of these interments a pair of odd fibulae, one being of the 

 cruciform, the other of the saucer or disc pattern, was found, one 

 upon one shoulder and the other upon the other of a female skeleton. 

 Similarly, or somewhat similarly, 'two large cruciform and two 

 circular fibulae of bronze,' now preserved in the York Museum, 

 were found with a skeleton in the Danes Dale Tumulus *. These 

 discoveries may seem of trifling moment, but they do go to show, 



which I am concerned, he says, • The " Anglo-Saxon Laws," vol. ii. contain several 

 lists of superstitious practices which the Church condemns, such as burning corn upon 

 graves. It is true that the compilations in which these ordinances occur are in one 

 sense not authentic, that is, have been ascribed to wrong authors ; but they probably 

 represent the customary laws of the Church here and on the continent with tolerable 

 fidelity.' 



^ ' Horae Ferales,' pp. 98-104. 



2 Opere cit., pp. 198, 255, 256, 304. 



^ Opere cit., p, 104. 



* See Catalogue, p. 93, and ' Coll. Antiq.' vi. pi. 28. 



