331 



Motes on jttttinjgton. 



By the Kev. C. S. Kuddle. 



S Durrington parish is bounded on the south by Amesbury 

 parish it may be said to be near Stonehenge : and it has 

 on its down evidences of this proximity in the many barrows which 

 Mr. Long has described in vol. xvi. of this Magazine. It may also 

 be seen in the map there reproduced from Hoare's " Ancient Wilts " 

 that a huge sarsen stone is marked on the southern border of the 

 parish on a line from the river to the avenue of Stonehenge, and 

 at no great distance from Durrington Walls. This stone has long 

 been called the Cuckoo Stone. Whether it was removed from, or, 

 as is more probable, was dropped on the way to Stonehenge, must 

 be uncertain. It must have been very near the old Wiltway, one 

 of the ancient tracks which skirted the upper part of Durrington 

 Walls before it was ploughed up. The Wiltway turned at a right 

 angle out of Packway, the old road from Bulford ; and was the way 

 to Wilton. Besides the barrows there were in 1864 in an arable 

 field approaching our Winterbourne boundary remains of about 

 thirty graves of common people ; but only two of them even then 

 nearly perfect. These were where the body had been laid north to 

 south, looking northward, upon the chalk rock which there 

 was about a foot below the surface. Flints had been set like 

 a low wall around the body, and apparently above it. The teeth 

 of one skeleton were in full number, but the cusps had worn off 

 and every tooth was level. In the skull was a triangular flint • 

 but if it belonged to a weapon, and had caused death, it was one 

 of the rudest ever fashioned. 



Durrington Walls, somewhat horse-shoe shaped, are based at 

 their narrow end upon the river. As they are arable they have 

 never been explored. The Avon bed there might, perhaps, repay 

 excavation. 



