16U KEY. G. 1(. HALL OX A BARROW 



dalesfolk are so wedded to this sentiment of their most ancient 

 ancestors at the present hour, that it is often difficult to persuade 

 them, even in a crowded churchyard like that of Birtley, where 

 primitive usages are still in full force, to consent to their relations 

 being interred on the north or shaded side, whose surface is 

 therefore but seldom disturbed until it becomes a necessity from 

 want of space elsewhere. The same reason which has caused the 

 Druidical circles of the Anglo- Scottish Borders to abound only in 

 the West, in "Westmoreland and Cumberland, may have some 

 connection with the avoidance of the western part of the barrow 

 for purposes of interment. Annum, the west, was the Sheol or 

 Hades of the ancient Britons, the land of the dead, and therefore 

 regarded with especial reverence.* And this may also have 

 something to do with the choice of its peculiar site as lying in the 

 western-most portion, probably, of the tribal territory of that 

 sept (of the Celtae) who inhabited the eastern bank of the river 

 and built this sepulchral monument. 



"With respect to the different " cistveini" or stone-lined graves, 

 and their dimensions, I shall take their natural order, as they 

 may have been originally arranged, and not that of their dis- 

 covery. The central cist was as follows, within the enclosing 

 slabs — the sides three feet four inches, and three feet two inches, 

 the upper end-slab one foot nine inches, and that at the bottom 

 one foot six inches. The flagstone underneath, at the depth of 

 one foot six inches, seemed almost to be squared by a modern 

 mason, so clearly defined was its form, three feet two inches 

 long by two feet one inch broad, and four inches in thickness. 

 This large freestone slab was reddened by fire on the upper sur- 

 face, and the cist itself was near to the spot where most of the 

 burnt stones were found. The stone-chippings found in it when 

 the sand was removed were also reddened, almost allowing the 

 conjecture that the body had been burnt within the cist. A good 

 deal of black earthy matter, of an unctuous nature, (no doubt, 

 the remains of the decayed body which had been placed here 

 uniurnt, and of the fragments of the funeral feast, perhaps, 



* Davics' " Celtic Researches," p. 17.". 



