ANCIENT EARTHWORKS 



ware button veined like marble; (9) some plates of fused lead ; and (10), most 

 noteworthy of all, two rude chess pieces made of jet (probably from York- 

 shire) ; these remarkable specimens have been variously ascribed to the ninth, 

 tenth, and twelfth centuries. Above the stratum of animal and vegetable 

 debris in the hollow (D) was a layer of pure vegetable soil (CC). Laid upon 

 this were a number of boulder stones forming a rough pavement. Associated 

 with these stones a silver penny of Henry III was found. On the top of this 

 pavement again there was another 3 ft. thickness of clay, earth, and sand (B). 

 In this a number of military and other relics belonging to the seventeenth 

 century were discovered. Tradition has always said that the mount was 

 raised higher by the Parliamentarian forces when they besieged the town in 

 the year 1 643, in order to place a cannon upon it and bombard the church. 

 The relics found in the top layer of the mount distinctly confirm this. 



The results of the various excavations seem to show that a dwelling con- 

 structed of timber once stood upon the saucer-shaped summit of the low oval 

 Mote Hill. This was evidently occupied long enough for a horrible fester- 

 ing mass of food refuse to accumulate upon its rush-covered floor, upon which, 

 and into a well, many objects which date from Saxon and Norman days were 

 dropped by former inhabitants of the dwelling. Subsequently a layer of fresh 

 clean earth appears to have been placed over this debris, and a rough pave- 

 ment of stone to have been laid thereon. That this was either during or 

 after the reign of Henry III is evidenced by the finding of the silver penny 

 associated with it. Many centuries after this the mount was again raised 

 3 ft., probably during the Civil Wars in 1643. These successive strata of 

 occupation remind us of those revealed by excavation in the mounts of Pen- 

 wortham and of Arkholme (q. v.) . Documentary evidence fortunately informs 

 us of the nature of the timber habitations which formerly stood upon the top 

 of the mount ; for in a survey of Warrington made in 1587 the Mote Hill 

 is called ' The scyt of the Man nor or Barronage, now decayed and no build- 

 inge thereuppon.' 



Whatever may have been the date of its origin, and whether the 

 large and important castle on the Mote Hill at Warrington was in exis- 

 tence much after 1228 (when we have mention of it) or not, no sub- 

 sequent walls of masonry replaced the original palisading of wood upon the 

 earthworks.^' 



West Derby (3 J miles east-north-east of Liverpool). — Only faint traces 

 upon the site now remain of the once important little castle here. A meadow 

 just across the old lane which runs diagonally on the north side of the new 

 church by the Croxteth Park gates still bears the name of the Castle Field ; 

 it can easily be identified by the police-station which has lately been erected 

 within it in the corner next the church. An inspection of this field reveals 

 a slightly raised area in its southern half, together with a series of shallow 

 depressions, which are quite distinct from the balks of former ploughings also 

 visible ; these depressions are seen much more distinctly on ascending the 



" Kendrick, Trans. Lanes, and Ches. Hist. Soc. iv, 1 8 ; v, 59-68 ; Gibson in Baines, Hist. Lanes, (ed. 1836), 

 iii, 580; Baines, Hist. Lanes, (ed. 1868), ii, 223-4; Whittaker, Hist. Manchester (1771), i, 203-4; Ormerod, 

 //wA C-5«. (1819), i,447; Pennant, Tour from Downing to j^ Is ton (tA. 1801), 11; 'W^tVm, Roman Lanes, zzi^-'^; 

 Objects in Warrington Museum ; Copies of Surveys, &c., Warrington Library ; Beaumont, Jnnals of Lords 

 of JVarrington {Chtt. Soc. Ixxxvi-Ixxxvii) ; Ord. Surv. l-in. 97, old 80 NE. ; 6-in. 116 NW. ; 25-in. 

 116, I. 



54.1 



