A Round Barrow on Stockbridge Down, Hampshire

Abstract

In a recent report (Proc. Prehist. Soc. iv, 1938, 249) we described the contents of a pit situated on Stockbridge Down on the ridge that runs south-west from Woolbury Ring Camp. This pit, the site of which is marked as X on the sketch-map which accompanies the present paper (fig. 1), contained an occupation or refuse layer of Middle Bronze Age date, the rarity of which warranted in our opinion examination of anything in the immediate vicinity that might have a bearing upon it.At least seven round barrows can be identified upon the down, but no record appears to exist of their having been examined. Their relative positions are also recorded on fig. 1, which is based partly upon the aerial photograph of the site published and described by O. G. S. Crawford and A. Keiller (Wessex from the Air, 1928, pl. xxv), and partly upon field work.The present paper describes the structure and contents of the round barrow that lies some 300 ft. south-west of the pit above mentioned. This barrow, which we have numbered no. 1 on fig. 1, is small and relatively insignificant, being only 25 ft. in diameter and about 18 in. in height. It had been constructed on ground that slopes gently to the south, and lies upon that area of the down that appears from both ground and aerial observation never to have been cultivated.