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Woolley Downs Barrows

Barrow / Cairn Cemetery

Miscellaneous

Three round barrows situated in the south-west corner of
Woolley Downs, Chaddleworth, between the parish boundary and the
Hungerford-Wantage road, were excavated in 1933.
Barrows A and B were similar in construction, consisting of
deep circular ditches, seventy and ninety feet in diameter
respectively, the spoil being thrown up to form rings of rubble
inside.
No interments were found in A, but B. contained an empty pit
near the centre and an undated secondary cremation in the chalk
ring.
Finds from A and B included Romano-British pottery, and sherds
ranging throughout the Iron Age. Barrow C contained pottery
fragments of both these periods plus one beaker sherd and
several pieces of Early or Middle Bronze Age pottery. They may
have been erected as early as 400 B.C. but more likely about
the beginning of the Christian era.
Their purpose, which was not determined, may not have been
sepulchral. Associated occupation debris dates until the second
century AD.
[C.SU 3991 8046] Barrow C was quite different from A & B and
appears to be a Late Bronze Age "scraped-together" barrow. Two
empty pits were found beneath the barrow and a double
inhumation burial, possibly Saxon, across the ditch.
ginger tt Posted by ginger tt
11th May 2009ce

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