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NOTES ON A LATE CELTIC KUBBISH HEAP, 

 NEAE OAEE. 



By Maud E. Cunnington. 



[Head at the Salisbury Meeting of the Society, 1908.] 



In Withy Copse on the Eainscombe estate and about a mile 

 north-east from the village of Oare, 1 an ancient rubbish heap 

 presenting the appearance of a low irregularly-shaped mound, is 

 now the only visible sign that the place was ever the site of human 

 habitation. 



To-day the spot is a secluded and lonely one, and its chief in- 

 habitants are the rabbits, who find the mound easy to burrow in, 

 and to whose unaided efforts the discovery of the interesting nature 

 ■of their home was in the first place due. 



Mr. F. N. Eogers, M.P., of Eainscombe, to whom the land 

 belongs, noticed that the rabbits constantly worked out fragments 

 of pottery from the mound. Some of this pottery he sent to Mr. 

 B. H. Cunnington, Hon. Curator of the Museum at Devizes, and 

 at his suggestion Mr. Eogers cut a trench into the mound, and 

 subsequently with great kindness gave Mr. Cunnington permission 

 to excavate the mound thoroughly. The work was carried out 

 in the autumn of 1907 and the spring of 1908. 



Withy Copse lies on sloping ground just to the north of Martin- 

 sell Camp ; on its upper side the copse is bounded by the ditch 

 and rampart of the Camp, and the mound itself is only a hundred 

 yards from the rampart. The mound is 63ft. long from south- 

 west to north-east, 43ft. across at the widest part, and is nowhere 

 higher than 2|ft. above the level of the ground. It is entirely 

 composed of a fine black mould of the same character throughout, 

 and with no old surface or bedding of any kind visible in section. 



1 This rubbish heap has in the last volume of the Magazine being variously 

 referred to as situated at Martinsell, Eainscombe, and Oare. 



