ON THE AGE OP STONE CIRCLES. 179 



In the N.W. and S.W. corners of the re-excavated fosse were two 

 shallow channels, or ' shutes,' which appeared to be artificial and cut 

 for a special purpose in the chalk wall ; or they may be due to an 

 unsuccessful attempt to square or round the corners uniformly. The 

 channel on the N.W. extended from top to bottom of the fosse (tailing 

 out at the bottom). That on the S.W. stopped about 12 ft. below the 

 brink of the fosse, and was crossed by two or three slight ledges in the 

 lower half. 



III. Human Remains found in the Silting of tlie Fosse. 



At a distance of 17 ft. from the east end and in the middle of the 

 cutting, a contracted human skeleton (No. 214), fully adult but of 

 small size, was uncovered at a depth of 5"8 ft. below the surface of the 

 silting. The unexpected discovery was made in mould with very little 

 admixture of chalk, at a time, unfortunately, when the surrounding 

 ground owing to a drizzling rain was sticky and slippery. My absence 

 at breakfast was also unfortunate, and on my return several of the 

 bones had been removed and the skull had evidently been trampled 

 upon before any part of it was actually seen by the workmen engaged 

 at this spot. Some of the bones had been thrown back ; these, how- 

 ever, were collected, the picks were set aside, and the clearing of the 

 interment and the surroundings was then carried out by Mrs. Gray and 

 myself, with the assistance of one man. It was seen at once that the 

 skeleton, although the bones were in sequence, was in a decidedly bad 

 state of preservation, and the bones had considerably decayed in many 

 instances. The flexed knees touched a large sarsen stone and the head 

 was to south. The long-bones were much decayed, with the exception 

 of the right tibia,* which, however, was fractured; it was carefully 

 measured in the ground, the length being 286 mm. (11 J in.), which, 

 adopting Topinard and Rollet's formuliB and taking the mean, gives a 

 stature of only 4 ft. 3 'SB in. for a female. She must therefore be 

 classed as a dwarf. ^ 



The skeleton was surrounded by twenty-three sarsen stones 

 (measuring from 6 in. to 24 in. in length), not arranged in symmetrical 

 order, but covering a roughly oval area about 7 ft. by 4 ft. One of 

 the stones appeared to be half a ring-stone.* 



• The tibia is not platycnemic, the latitudinal index being 731. 



' Dwarf skeleton from Dog Holes, Warton Crag, Lanes. — Four bones of this 

 individual are sufficiently perfect for measurement, and these are a left tibia 

 (length 305 mm.), a left fibula (length 292 mm.), a left radius (length 226 mm.), 

 and a right humerus (length 258 mm.). In all probability the Dog Holes 

 femora were about 365 mm. in length when perfect. Adopting Eollet and 

 Topinard's formulae for calculating the height, we get an average height from 

 the four bones for the dwarf of 4 ft. 4| in. The epiphyses are united, showing 

 that growth was complete. Age about twenty-five years. There is apparently 

 an absence of pathological conditions {Trans. Lanes, and Cheshire Antiq. Soc. 

 XXX.. 1913, 113-114). 



• In the Roman stratum above, in various places but more or less over the 

 position of the skeleton, lumps of sarsen had been met with ; two pieces measured 

 18 in. in length each; another 27 in. by 18 in. by 7 in. ; and another 21 in. by 

 18 in. by 7 in. Further west a large sarsen slab was found in the surface mould, 

 length 47 in., max. width 24 in., max. thickness 11 in. (thin on all sides). The 

 latter was probably split off one of the stones of the outer circle and shot over 

 into the fosse, 



N 2 



