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AN ACCOUNT OF THE OPENING OF THE TUMULUS " HOWE HILL," 
DUGGLEBY. BY J. R. MORTIMER. 
This large flat-topped circular barrow (pi. vii.) was opened by the 
present Sir Tatton Sykes, Bart., of Sledmere, during July and 
August, 1890. It stands on the sloping hillside, about 13 chains 
length S.S.E. of the village of Duggleby, in and near which rise 
the springs which form the Gypsey Stream. It resembled in size 
and circular form two other large barrows on the neighbouring chalk 
wolds ; one, Mickle Head, about nine miles S.W. of Duggleby, at the 
foot of Garrowby Hill ;* and the other near Wold Newton, named 
" Willy Howe," eleven miles distant, in an easterly direction. The 
latter has been similar in size (about 125 feet in diameter) to the 
Duggleby barrow, and it also stands on the foot of the southern side of 
the same midwold valley, and about the same distance south of the 
Gypsey stream. In short the two barrows are in every respect so 
much alike that their resemblance would seem to be more than acci- 
dental. They may be the monuments of two neighbouring and 
kindred chiefs held in equal honour, and over whose remains similar 
monuments were raised. Of the three barrows the Garrowby one is 
far the largest, having a diameter of 250 feet at the base, and an 
elevation of about 50 feet. This mound does not appear to have 
been opened, but " Willy Howe " has been twice examined ; once 
by the late Lord Londesborough in 1857, f and again by Canon 
Greenwell in 1887. The latter search was made within the limits of 
the former opening, with a view to discover the primary interments 
which might have been passed over by the previous explorers. On 
neither occasion was there observed any indication of a body. 
* This mound is not marked as a tumulus on the ordnance maps ; the 
writer, however, believes it to be artificially formed. 
t This opening, which was east and west through the centre, was not 
more than 18 feet wide at the bottom, and probably not more than 16 feet. 
Therefore the experience gained in opening " Howe Hill," Duggleby, 
renders it possible that the primary burial in " Willy Howe" yet remains un- 
discovered, probably near to the north side of the opening made by the late 
Lord Londesborough. Had the excavation in " Howe Hill," Duggleby, been 
no wider than that .made in " Willy Howe," the two graves containing the 
primary interments would not have been discovered. 
