TEAVERING BELL AND HAREHOPE FORT 159 



is no appearance of the foundation having been cut out level 

 to the thickness of the wall, or even cut into level steps or 

 stages so as to give the stones a level bed. This defect has 

 increased the tendency natural to drystone building to slide 

 downwards. At one part of the central building of Homildon 

 the whole mass of building has shifted outside the line 

 of wall, as laid down by the curb, and the same thing occurs 

 in part of the wall of the Western lunette or extension at 

 Yeavering Bell. 



In a very able article on Yeavering Bell, contributed to 

 the Proceedings of this Club in 1862, the late Mr George 

 Tate, Alnwick, estimated the population of the surrounding 

 district in the Celtic period as about five hundred ; but this, 

 I should think, very much underestimates it, as the clusters 

 of dwellings and enclosures on Swint Law, the Midd-hill, 

 and Worm Law might alone account for that population. 

 It has to be borne in mind that on every shelf or platform 

 round the Bell, remains of dwellings are to be found, 

 extending down to where the operations of modern husbandry 

 cause them to disappear, from which it may be concluded 

 that even a larger number would formerly exist on the lower 

 and richer slopes. They were a pastoral race ; and it is not 

 necessary to suppose that they lived entirely on the produce 

 of the ground immediately surrounding their dwellings, the 

 lines of roadway or track, of which there are at least five 

 traceable, affording facilities for grazing their flocks over a wide 

 district of hill and dale. Without insisting on any large 

 permanent population occupying the Hill Forts, I should 

 think five thousand a moderate estimate of the aggregate 

 number from which men-at-arms might be drawn for their 

 defence. The erection of residences in the neighbourhood 

 by some of the earliest of the Saxon kings, as for instance, 

 in the vicinity of Old Yeavering, the " Adgefrin " of the 

 Venerable Bede, shows that the district remained one of 

 importance, and stood in need of looking after. 



In connection with Mr Tate's paper, considerable excava- 

 tions were carried out by instructions of the Duke of 

 Northumberland, several of the circles inside the great 

 Yeavering fort being opened. Portions of rings of oak were 

 found in three of them, the diameter of which had been 11 



