410 REPORTS ON THE STATE OK SCIENCE. 



3. Mixed silting, average thickness 3-8 feet, consisting of rather darker loamy 

 mould than the surface silting, and containing a fair proportion of small lumps of 

 chalk from a inch across to about 2 inches. On the W. side of the cutting a 

 hard band of lumps of chalk was noticed across the middle of this stratum. Some 

 of the lumps were 3 or 4 inches long, and resulted from a sudden fall of chalk 

 from the profile of the fosse. This layer, 2 inches thick, was so hard that the 

 foreman thought at first that the bottom of the fosse had been reached. 



4. Fine mixed silting, average thickness 2 feet. A narrow, curved layer, con- 

 sisting of fine chalk mixed with a small proportion of light yellowish-brown loam 

 or mould. 



5. Chalk rubble, average thickness 7-8 feet. The upper layers of this deposit 

 consisted of rather small lumps of chalk seldom more than 3 inches across, and 

 usually much smaller. Some of the pieces were found agglutinated as if by the 

 lime contained in water which had percolated through the silting. The lumps of 

 chalk were larger towards the bottom. Occasionally thin curved seams of mould 

 were observed in this deposit, caused by the falling of turf and mould from the 

 margins of the open fosse as it was gradually widening and falling from natural 

 causes, or by the deposit of surface mould thrown up undesignedly during the 

 process of buildins: the vallum. 



(e) Other Notes on the Pottery. — Every fragment of pottery found in Cutting I. 

 is projected into the sectional diagram accompanying this Report, the diflerent 

 qualities being represented by symbols to show their relative denth at a glance. 

 The position of each fragment was carefully marked, as discovered, in the sectional 

 diagram, and the classification which was subsequently added was made quite 

 independently of the depth at which it was found. 



The five pieces of early British pottery of Bronze Age type, found at depths 

 varying from 7 feet to 12-5 feet, consisted of one smooth fragment containing 

 fine grains of quartz (the No. 4 British quality of Pitt-Rivers) and four pieces of 

 ware, containing large grains of quartz, of the roughest description, and as rude 

 as the piece of pottery found with the Stone Age interments in Wor Barrow, 

 Handley.* (The latter, however, contained large grains of chalk and not quartz.) 



The twenty-five fragments of Romano-British and the three pieces of Roman pot- 

 tery have already been briefly described in Section b. It remains, therefore, to say 

 something with regard to the shards of Norman and mediasval pottery, which, 

 taken as a whole, are typical of the period. This pottery bears a very close 

 resemblance, both in quality, fo)-m, and general character, to that found by me in 

 the great camp of Castle Neroche, seven miles S.S.E. of Taunton.- The trained 

 eye has no great difficulty in distinguishing between medioeval and pre-Norman 

 pottery, although it is true that ' puzzles ' occasionally crop up. Norman pottery 

 was comparatively plentiful in the upper strata of the silting of the fosse, indicat- 

 ing probably a large population at Avebury during that period. Among the 

 shards are a large proportion of pieces of rims and bottoms of vessels ; less 

 frequently bandies of pots were found, and fragments bearing definite traces of 

 glaze. 



(f) Other Finds, Cutting I. (see numbers in Sectional Diagram). Flint 

 Implements.— ^2. Long knife with dorsal ridge slightly worked along both edges, 

 with evidence of prolonged use.^ Depth, 6-3 feet in the chalk rubble. 



76. Large worked flake. Depth, 10 feet in the chalk rubble. 



81. Large rough scraper-shaped flake. Depth, 4 feet in the mixed silting. 



85. Flake worked to a bevelled edge along one side. Depth, 7-3 feet in the 

 chalk rubble. 



96. Finely worked knife (the only weU-chipped implement found). Depth, 

 13 feet in the chalk rubble, and within 4 feet of the floor of the fosse. 



In addition, four large pieces of flint, bearing signs of slight rough flaking and 

 hammering, were found in the upper strata of the fosse. Of flint flakes, un worked, 



' Excavations in Cranhorne Chase, iv., plate 257, fig. 19. 

 ■-' Pruc. Sum. Arch. Sac, xlix.. part ii., pp. 23-53. 



