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«re alfo abundant in the northern conntics of England, 

 North Wales, Scotland, and Ireland ; but moll of ihcfe 

 confifl of vail pilts of ilones, and are dtrfignatcd hy the 

 name of " earn," or " cairn." (See Carn.) The moll 

 conliHerable barrow in Englar.d is that of Silbiiry Hill in 

 Wilt.liire. (See Avebi-ry.) A barrow in DerbylTiiie, 

 fituatc on the fummit of a hill called " Fin-cop," has been 

 carefully iriveftigatej by Mr. Hayman Rooke, (See Ar- 

 chxologia, vol. xii.) It difcloftd two or three (Ivtletons, 

 one of which had an oblong piece of dreffed black Derby- 

 fliire marble fallened by a flrong cement to the ll<ull : fome 

 urns alio appeared, with aflies and bumt bot:ts, together 

 with arrow-htads of flint, and a fpcar-hcad fhaped out of a 

 piece of liinc-ftonc, and made vciy fiiarp at the pomt. 

 Mr. Rooke conjectures, tl'.at tliis elevated i'pot, fecured by 

 a do[;ble fer.ce, m.ay have been the fite of a Britilh to'.vn or 

 fortrefs, and that the barrow v.-as the fepulchre of the chief- 

 tain and his relatives ; the weapons of flii.t and of liine-Ho!ie 

 undoubtedly fugged a very remote period, and, when found 

 as thefe were, appear to indicate the relics of a primitive and 

 barbarous people. Dr. Plott takes notice of two forts of 

 barrows in OxfordfViire, one placed on the military vvays, 

 the other in the fields, meadows, woods, &c. ; the former 

 he fuppofcd were of Roman tredion, and the latter 

 were more probably erected by the Britons or Danes. 

 Some of thefe barrows appear rude, and conihucled only of 

 earth ; others are more regular, and trenched round, iomc 

 of them with two or three circumvillatio.is, ar.d furmountcd 

 with monumental ftones. (Plott's Nat. Flid. Oxfordfhire, 

 ch. X. § 48.) We have an examination of the barro.vs in 

 Cornwall by Dr. Williams, in t!ie " Philofophical Tranf- 

 aftions," N°458. ; from whofe obfei-vations we find, that 

 thefe barrows arc compofed of foreign or adventitious earth ; 

 that is, fnch as does not occur on the fpot, but mult have 

 been fetched from fome dillance. In one of them was found 

 an urn made of burnt or calcined earth, very hard, and very 

 black within ; it had four fmall handles, and in it were 

 found fevcn quarts of burnt bones and aflies. As it was the 

 ancient praftice to burn the dead, it appears from thefe 

 barrows, how the people that ufcd this mode of burial ex- 

 prelfed their refpeft for the dead ; it was by erefting over 

 them thefe tumuli or barrows, compofed of earth or ftone 

 brought from dillant places ; and the barrow was generally 

 proportioned to the rank and power of the deceafed perfon. 

 Each foldier, or friend, might bring fome of the earth or 

 ftones from dillant places where they lived, and thus com- 

 pofe the tumulus. Many paffagts might be quoted from 

 ancient authors to this purpol'e. The contents of thefe 

 barrows, as well as their fize and form, have been very va- 

 rious : in fome have been found Hone chells containing en- 

 tire bones ; and in others, bones neither lodged in chefts 

 nor depofited in urns : arms of various forts, amber beads, 

 tie. have not been uncommon. 



The links or fands of Skail in Sandwick, one of the Ork- 

 ney iflands, abounds in rour.d barrows, fome formed of 

 earth alone, and others of llone covered with earth. In 

 the former was found a coffin made of fix flat Hones, and as 

 it was too lliort to receive a body at full length, the flceletons 

 had their knees prefied to the breall, and the legs doubled 

 along the thighs. A bag made of ruflies has been found 

 at the feet of fome of thefe flcclctons, which contained the 

 bones, probably, of another perfon of the fame family. In 

 one of thefe were difcovered multitudes of fmall beetles ; 

 and -\s fimdar infedls have been found in the bag which in- 

 clofed the facrcd Ibis, it may be fuppofed thal^the Egyp- 

 tians, and the nation to which thefe tumuli btlcngcd, might 



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have had the fame fuperllition rcfpecling tlietii. Some of 

 the coi-pfcs interred in this ifland appear to have beeri 

 burned ; as the allies depofited in an urn which was covered 

 with a flat llone, have been found in the cell of one of the 

 barrows. This coffin, or cell, was placed on the ground, 

 then covered with a heap of Hones, and cafed with earth or 

 fods. This barrow and its contents evince them to be of a 

 different age from the former. Thefe timmli appeared to 

 be a kind of family vaults, two tiers of coffins having been 

 found in them ; and it is not improbable, that on the death 

 of any one of the family, the tumulus was opened, and the 

 body interred near its kindred bones. 



Barrows arc very numerous in Ireland. Ledwich fnp- 

 pofes them to liave been of Scythian origin, and to have 

 been introduced in Britain after the Ron'.ans had left it. It 

 was a law of Odin the great Gothic legillator, that large 

 barrows fhould be raifed to perpetuate the memory of cele- 

 brated chiefs ; thefe were compofed of llone and earth, and 

 were formed with great labour and fame art. At New 

 Grange in the county of Meath is a mount of this kind, the 

 altitude of which from the horizontal floor of the cr.ve is 

 about 70 feet, the circumference at the top is 300 feet, and 

 the bafe covers two acres ot land. It is founded on an 

 aflonifliing coUeClion of Ilones, and covered with gravel and 

 earth. In the " brende-tiid," or fiery age, which was the 

 firll among the Norllicrns, the body was ordered by Odira 

 to be burned with all its ornaroents, and the afhes to be 

 collecled in an urn and laid in a grave ; but in the " hoelll- 

 tiid," or age of hillocks, being the fecund, the body, un- 

 touched by fire, was depc-fitcd in a cave or fepulchre under a 

 barrow ; and this mode was praftifcd till the third epoch, 

 called " chri!lcndomts-oid," or the age of Ciiriflianity. 

 Governor Pownall, who has given an account of New 

 Grange, in the fecond volume of the " Archreologia," ob- 

 ferves, that the mode of burial, and the fpecits of fepulchral 

 monument at New Grange, may be traced through Den- 

 mark, Sweden, Ruffia, Poland, and the fteppes of 'I'artary^ 

 and he conjeftures that this mouut was a Danifli work ; 

 which was alio the opinion of fir Thomas Mo'.vneux, M.D, 

 in his " ElTay on Danifli Mounts," publiilied with " Boate's 

 Natural Hillory of Ireland." About 1 699, a Mr. Camp- 

 bell, who refided in the village of New Gratige, obferving 

 ftones under the green fod, carried many of them away, 

 and at length arrived at a broad flat llone that covered the 

 mouth of the gallery. At the entrance, this gallery is 3 fett 

 wide and 2 high ; at 13 feet from the entrance, it is but 

 2, feet 2 inches wide: the length of the gallery, from its 

 mouth to the beginning of the dome, i? 62 feet ; from tlience 

 to the upper part of the dome, 1 1 feet 6 inches ; the 

 whole length being 714 feet. The dome or cave, with the 

 long galiei-)', exhibits the exaft figure of a crofs, the length. 

 between the arms of wliich is 20 feet: the dome forms an 

 oftagori, 20 feet high, with an area of about 1 7 feet ; it iS 

 compofed of long flat ftones, the upper projefting a little 

 below the lower, and clofed in and capped with a flat flag. 

 There are two large oval rock bafons in this cave, one in 

 each arm of the crofs ; from which, and the cruciform 

 fliape of the llruclure, it is fuppofed to be the work of femi- 

 chiillian Oilmen in the ninth century. The cuftom of bu- 

 lging the treafure acquired by piracy, in tke barrows of 

 great men, accounts for the Roman coins found at New 

 Grange. For a more particular account, t'.ic reader is re- 

 ferred to Mr. Ledwich's Antiquities of Ireland, p. J07— 

 328. General Valiancy, however, and other antiquarians, 

 confider this cave at Nev^r Grange to have been " antrum 

 Mithrs," or a cave for the worlhip of the fun, introduced 



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