318 



Examination of Barrows on 



triplet, were opened, they were also found to cover interments 

 after cremation. 



2. This barrow is on Morgan's Hill just above Old Shepherd's 

 Shore, close to, and on the south of, the barrier of Wansdyke. It is 

 of the simple bowl- form and about three feet high. The turf over 

 it was perfectly smooth and appeared never to have been disturbed. 

 At a depth of three and a half feet, in an oval cist in the natural 

 surface of the chalk was the skeleton of a man, about thirty years 

 of age and probably six feet in height. The skeleton was in a con- 

 tracted position, with the head to the north, the knees drawn up 

 and the legs completely flexed behind the thighs. There was no 

 other relic of any kind. The skull (of which four views are given 1 ) 

 is of full size, and had contained a brain weighing upwards of 

 53 oz. It approaches to the shortened-oval or brachycephalic 

 form. The forehead is narrow but moderately full and high : the 

 nasal bones project most abruptly. The facial bones are of full 

 size and ragged. The ascending process of the lower jaw is broad 

 and rectangular. The teeth are large, one molar only having been 

 lost during life, from the effects of an alveolar abscess. Their 

 crowns are much worn, the eroded and hollow surfaces having an 

 oblique position. The thigh bones measured nineteen and a half, 

 and the leg bones (tibiso) fifteen and a half inches in length. 



3. A large conical mound, with steep irregular sides and nearly 

 seven feet high, on the west of Morgan's Hill, close to the foss on 

 the north side of Wansdyke and just above its junction with the 

 Roman road from Ounetio. 2 A large shaft was sunk through the 

 centre to the depth of seven feet, but nothing was found excepting 

 some black wood ashes at two feet, and again at five feet. The 

 probable conclusion is, that this was a beacon or specular mound 

 commanding the extensive vale of the Avon, which spreads out below 



1 We are indebted to Mr. J. B. Davis, F.S.A., for the use of these wood en- 

 gravings, which are taken from the Fourth Decade of the "Crania Britannica," 

 where a lithographed full -sized profile view of this skull is also given. 



2 Shown in Hoare's Ancient Wilts, vol. ii. pi. 5, No. 2 ; and in Stukeley's 

 Abury, pi. 10. The mound described must have been close to the gibbet seen 

 in this last plate. 



