of much earlier date to be met with on these Downs, in the Barrows or Tumuli, which are so numerously scattered around. That these mounds of earth were funereal has been clearly and satisfactorily proved-and that they were raised prior to the invasion of the Romans can scarcely be doubted.

The most simple and natural kind of sepulchral monument, and what appears to have been the most antient and universal, consists of a mound of earth or heap of stones raised over the remains of the deceased, and this custom appears to have obtained among the earliest nations of antiquity; the obsequies of Patroclus are thus described in the twenty-third book of the Iliad;

"The Greeks obey! where yet the embers glow,
Wide o'er the pile the sable wine they throw,
Next the white bones his sad companions place,
With tears collected in a golden vase,

The sacred relics to the tent they bore,

The urn a veil of linen covered o'er,
That done, they bid the sepulchre aspire,

And cast the deep foundations round the pyre;
High in the midst they heap the swelling bed
Of rising earth, memorial of the dead."

The custom of burying the body entire was the most primitive, that of reducing it to ashes was of later introduction both were in use among the Greeks and Ro

:

mans, and we have every reason to believe that among the antient Britons both prevailed at the same time.

The annexed engraving represents the four largest Tumuli on these Downs; they are on the summit of the hill which forms that beautiful valley called Kingly Bottom, and may be seen for a distance of many miles. They are circular in their form, constructed with great regularity and composed of alternate strata of flint and earth. Nos. 1, 2, and 4 present slight appearances of having been injudiciously, and therefore, as to results, unsuccessfully opened; these three have also each a vallum at their base. The exterior of these curious and interesting monuments presents no appearances by which we may be enabled to draw any inference by whom, or even for what purpose they were raised. A careful examination of their contents, however, will at once remove the doubt, and with this view numbers of them have been opened, many in Sussex, but by far the greater part in Wiltshire; in all, the result has been the same, and establishes the fact of their origin and object most fully, viz. that they were monuments raised over the dead, by the Inhabitants of this Island before the invasion of the Romans. No 5 shews the section of an open Tumulus ;* the body was placed entire, with the

*This section, the sketch of which was supplied by Mr. King gives us an excellent idea of the ancient mode of burial: it points out the cist for the primary interment, also the cist for the urns, sometimes placed at the end of the Tumuli, and not unfrequently, if an after deposit, a little way below the surface.

legs gathered up, in an excavation, or as it is termed, cist, covered with chalk or flints, and the mound raised over it: this was the primary interment. When the body was first burnt, the ashes were collected together, put into an urn and buried, the mouth covered with a tile being placed downwards, either in the cist, or as is the case in the present instance on one side of it. These urns are composed of very coarse materials, rudely formed, before the use of the lathe was known, and in many instances very imperfectly baked: the patterns with which they are ornamented display a great variety of design, and are evidently worked by hand, not by a mould. They seem to be indented on the clay when in a moist state, by some pointed instrument, and to have been baked either in the sun, or the fire of the funeral pile. Such, without exception, have been the urns found in our Barrows; all claiming a rude and remote British origin. After the Roman conquest a new species of pottery was introduced among the Britons, beautifully moulded, finely glazed and richly ornamented, numerous fragments of which are to be found in all the villages of the Romanized Britons, but not the smallest morsel, neither a coin, nor a letter, nor in fact the slightest indication of a Roman population in these Tumuli.*

Having thus hastily noticed the resting places of the *The extreme rudeness of our sepulchral urns, as well as the

dead, we will bestow a few words on the habitations of the living. We have, says Sir. R. C. Hoare, undoubted proofs from history, and from existing remains, that the earliest habitations were pits, or slight excavations in the ground, covered and protected from the inclemency of the weather, by boughs of trees, or sods of turf. The high grounds were pointed out by nature, as the fittest for these early settlements, being less encumbered by wood, and affording a better pasture for the numerous flocks and herds, from which the erratic tribes of the first colonists drew their means of subsistence; but after the conquest of our island by the Romans, when, by means of their enlightened knowledge, society became more civilized, the Britons began to quit the elevated ridge of chalk hills, and seek more sheltered and desirable situations. At first, we find them removed into the sandy vales immediately bordering on the chalk hills; and at a later period, when the improved state of society under the Romans ensured them security, the vallies were cleared of wood, and towns and villages were erected in the plains near rivers, which after the departure of the Romans, became the residence of the Saxons. But a considerable period must have elapsed before these important changes took place, for on our bleakest hills

articles deposited within our Barrows, evidently prove their very high antiquity, and mark them of an æra prior to the Roman InSir R. C. Hoare.

vasion.