The Modern Antiquarian. Stone Circles, Ancient Sites, Neolithic Monuments, Ancient Monuments, Prehistoric Sites, Megalithic MysteriesThe Modern Antiquarian

Launceston Down North Group

Barrow / Cairn Cemetery

Miscellaneous

The Launceston Down North Group comprised a cluster of at least five small barrows located around 95451145, 220 ft. above O.D. on the southward-facing slope of a dry combe falling E. to the Crichel brook; all have now been levelled by cultivation, but each barrow was examined by J. H. Austen in 1864. One yielded nothing. Another yielded a cremation, probably secondary, in an urn now lost, together with 'the point of a bronze spear or dagger'. A third barrow yielded a primary cremation in a barrel urn of 'South Lodge' type, in a pit cut in the Chalk. A fourth barrow yielded a cremation, probably secondary, in a similar urn. A fifth barrow yielded a primary cremation in a pit, and two cremations, probably secondary, above it, one of the latter having a plain urn (C.T.D., Pt. 2, nos. 36–40; Ant. J., XIII (1933), 447; Arch. J., CXIX (1962), 20, 54, 55). In 1938 four more urns, not covered by barrows but apparently part of an urnfield, were found in the vicinity of the barrow group; three of them contained cremations, one with a fragment of a bronze spearhead (Arch., XC (1944), 50, 60, 61).
(45) Bowl (95821132), now levelled by ploughing, but visible as a ring-ditch soil-mark, lies at 230 ft. above O.D. on the northward-facing slope of a dry combe which falls E. to the Crichel brook. The first Dyke noted above (16) skirts it on the S. Diam. about 30 ft.
(46) Disc (95881133), 70 yds. E. of (45) and in a similar situation and condition, lies on the parish boundary with Long Crichel; it consists of a circular ditch, 150 ft. in diameter, with traces of an inner and an outer bank, and of a small mound S.E. of the centre. Dyke (16) appears to cut the outer bank on the S.
(47) Bowl (95731150), on the S.-facing slope of a dry combe, 220 ft. above O.D. and now levelled by ploughing; diam. about 30 ft.
(48) Bowl (95771153), 55 yds. N.E. of (47) and on the parish boundary with Long Crichel, is now levelled; former diam. 60 ft., ht. 1 ft. (Dorset Barrows, Long Crichel No. 4). Beaker sherds were found in a rabbit scrape on the mound in 1937 (note by C. D. Drew, D.C.M.).
(49) Bowl (95591190), in the extreme N. of the parish, on a gentle N. slope at 250 ft. above O.D., was excavated by S. and C. M. Piggott in 1938 (No. 10); it contained a primary cremation in a barrel urn (Arch., XC (1944), 61–2, 72–3; Arch. J., CXIX (1962), 55; Helinium, I (1961), 116).

http://www.british-history.ac.uk/rchme/dorset/vol4/pp105-107#h3-0005
Chance Posted by Chance
2nd April 2016ce

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