274 On Urns and Antiquities of the Cheviot Hills. 



Ilderton. 

 The adjoining estate of Ilderton is sprinkled with memorials 

 of the ancient inhabitants. Two have been described. On Dec. 

 14, 1863, a burial place was ploughed up on Ilderton farm on a 

 round knoll which rises several feet above the ordinary level of 

 the adjoining ground. " It is difficult to say whether any barrow 

 covered it or not." " The cist was formed of four slabs of sand- 

 stone set on edge, with a flooring of small flags, and one large 

 stone 5 feet 6 inches long by 3 feet broad as a cover. The cist 

 lay east and west, and was about 8 feet 6 inches long by 1 foot 

 10 inches wide, and 18 inches deep. The body had been doubled 

 up and laid upon its left side, with the head to the east, the 

 hands had been folded upon the beliy, the legs drawn up so as 

 to bring the knees close to the chin, and the head and fore-part 

 of the body slightly inclined forward." " No urn or weapon was 

 found in the cist." The measurements of the skull were abuve 

 the average of brachy-cephalicism. Canon Greenwell, who along 

 with Dr Embleton examined the cranium and other relics, attri- 

 butes the burial " to the later period of the time during which a 

 bronze-using people occupied Britain before the Roman invasion, 

 and who were, in the main, the inhabitants of our country at 

 that time." (See full account in Nat. Hist. Trans, of Northum- 

 berland and Durham, i., pp. 143-148. Plates XIII. and XIY : 

 figures of the Cranium). 



The following I owe to Mr Moffatt : "I was at the opening of 



a cist in one of the tu- 

 muli in the Galloway 

 field, Ilderton estate, 

 about 16 or 18 years 

 ago, which cist contained 

 one of the most perfect 

 doubled up skeletons of 

 the primitive pre-his- 

 toric eras discovered up 

 to that time in the 1 9th 

 century. Photos were 

 taken of the skull by a 

 local artist ; measure- 

 ments of the skull and 

 of some of the principal 

 arm and leg bones were 

 also made for compara- 



Fiij. 4. 



