Miscellaneous Notes on Deneholes. 
107 
Appendix II. 
On Rock Granaries. 
The following descriptions of subterranean granaries now 
used in India and South America seem to me worth giving, 
in the present divided state of opinion as to the original pur¬ 
pose for which Deneholes were constructed. For as these 
accounts are the work of men who have been for many years 
resident in the above countries, and as the granaries described 
are still in use there, we get a fuller and more accurate notion 
as to their details than can usually be obtained from the 
quickly-passing traveller, or respecting excavations now 
neglected, or used for a variety of other purposes. 
In a book published in 1878 (London), and called ‘ Thirteen 
Years among the Wild Beasts of India, by G. P. Sanderson, 
Officer in Charge of the Government Elephant-Catching 
Establishment in Mysore,’ the following account is given of 
subterranean granaries in Southern India :— 
“ They are usually situated on somewhat high ground, and 
in gravelly soil or decomposed rock. Then- construction is 
simple. A circular hole about two feet in diameter is dug to 
three feet in depth, when a domed chamber of an oval shape 
is excavated, capable of containing from ten to twenty cart¬ 
loads of grain. Neither masonry nor props are used. A little 
straw is laid on the floor, and against the walls of the chamber 
to a third of their height, when the grain is filled in. A slab 
is placed over the pit at the bottom of the short shaft that 
enters it, and the shaft is then filled in with earth. Ragi thus 
stored will keep for an indefinite number of years. It is safe 
from insects and rats, and is not easily accessible to thieves, 
as the pits are generally situated near the village,— sometimes 
in the streets,—and it takes some little time to dig to the 
grain. Moreover, it is highly dangerous to enter a ragi-pit 
till twelve hours or more after it has been opened. The 
carbonic acid gas generated therein is instantaneously fatal, 
and, though natives are well aware of this, accidents frequently 
happen.” 
The following account of the rock-granaries of Peru and 
Bolivia is given me by my cousin, Mr. J. J. Winder, who has 
been for more than twenty years a resident in South America, 
chiefly at Tupiza, in Bolivia. He says :■—“There are very many 
of them throughout the whole of the high table-land of Bolivia 
and Peru; there may be some in other places, but I do not 
remember having seen any. Generally they are small in size, 
are in granite or porphyry, and each belongs exclusively to 
one family. In one place, however, a storehouse of large 
