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Excavation of a Neolithic Barrow on Whiteleaf Hill, Bucks

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

V. G. Childe  and
Isobel Smith
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Extract

Sir Lindsay Scott carried out excavations on the barrow on Whiteleaf Hill, near Princes Risborough, Bucks., with meticulous care from 1934 till the outbreak of war in 1939 interrupted operations. After the war he had no opportunity to resume excavations beyond making a 2 ft. section across the ditch on the west, and he was not able to complete the work he had planned or to prepare the material for publication before his untimely death in 1952. He gave four short and explicitly provisional reports in P.P.S. 1935, p. 132; 1936, p. 312; 1937, p. 440, and in the Records of Bucks. 1941–6, p. 298, but insisted that ‘this description must be taken as entirely provisional.’ His papers comprised a master plan contoured at 6 inch intervals, and showing the grid over the excavated area, small detailed plans of individual features—post holes, pits, and the ‘peristalith trench’—and a series of sections taken across the whole excavated area at 2 ft. intervals on both X and Y axes, but no complete plan of the excavated area nor any detailed description of the observations made in the course of the excavation. The relics are, however, all numbered with three co-ordinates, so that the position of each can be exactly located on the plans and sections, and these, especially the Neolithic pottery, are of such exceptional importance that it is an obvious duty to attempt a provisional account of the results achieved, without waiting for the completion of the excavation.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 20 , Issue 2 , December 1955 , pp. 212 - 230
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1955

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References

page 215 note 1 What looks like a similar kidney-shaped barrow surrounded by a ditch, though badly disturbed, has been recognized by Mrs Alison Young, F.S.A., on Warnes Hill at the extremity of Bledlow Ridge just across the valley from Whiteleaf Hill.

page 217 note 1 British Barrows (1877), 11Google Scholar. cf. Newbigin in P.P.S. N.s. III (1937), 189 ff.Google Scholar

page 219 note 1 The type was distinguished as AIC at Skara Brae (Childe, , Skara Brae (1931), 115Google Scholar).

page 224 note 1 Calkin, , Proc. Dorset Nat. Hist. & Arch. Soc., 69 (1947)Google Scholar.

page 224 note 2 It is suggested that the name ‘Mildenhall ware’ may appropriately be applied to the developed form of Western Neolithic pottery found in Essex and East Anglia. The name derives from the important habitation site near Mildenhall in Suffolk which has already yielded much material and is now being extensively excavated by Professor J. G. D. Clark. This group has been called ‘East Anglian ware’ by ProfessorPiggott, (Neo. Cult. Br. Is., 1954, 72)Google Scholar, but the proposed alteration may be justified on the grounds that the group extends outside East Anglia proper and that it is desirable to adhere to a uniform system of type-site nomenclature.

page 224 note 3 It is convenient to use this brief designation for rims which project on both sides of the neck; it should not, however, be taken to imply that such rims invariably lie horizontally.

page 224 note 4 Leeds, , Ant. J., sVII (1927)Google Scholar, pl. LII, fig. 2, n (profile not shown); figs. 7a, 8b; fig. 6, 4.

page 224 note 5 Ibid., pl. LIII, fig. 2, c.

page 224 note 6 Williamson, Ross, Suss. Arch. Coll., LXXI (1930), pl. XI, 51, 54Google Scholar; Curwen, , Ant. J., XIV (1934), fig. 34 and figs. 19–21Google Scholar.

page 224 note 7 Of the considerable number of such bowls now known, few are as yet published, but for material from Mildenhall cf. Briscoe, , Proc. Camb. Ant. Soc., XLVII (1954), 13–24Google Scholar.

page 226 noet 1 Ipswich Museum.

page 226 note 2 Warren, et al. , P.P.S., 11 (1936), pl. XXXIX, 13Google Scholar.

page 226 note 3 Warren, and Smith, , Tenth Annual Report, Institute of Archaeology (1954)Google Scholar, fig. 2,1 (also figured in Piggott, loc. cit., fig. 11, 5 as from Ipswich); Warren et al., loc. cit., pl. XXXIX, 4; and another unpublished specimen.

page 226 note 4 Sherds, probably from two pots, illustrated in Warren et al, loc. cit., pl. XXXIX, 1. The lattice pattern is not apparent in the photograph.

page 226 note 5 Leaf, , Proc. Camb. Ant. Soc., XXXV (1935), pl. 1Google Scholar; also Piggott, loc. cit., fig. 11.

page 227 note 1 Grimes, . P.P.S., v (1939), fig. 6Google Scholar.

page 227 note 2 Williams, , Arch. Camb., CII (1953), fig. 12, 31Google Scholar.

page 227 note 3 Clifford, , P.P.S., IV (1938). fig. 3Google Scholar.

page 227 note 4 In Clifford, loc. cit., 211.

page 227 note 5 Avebury Museum, reg. no. 19418.

page 227 note 6 Leeds, , Ant. J., VIII (1927). fig. 6, 8Google Scholar; and, unpublished, Ashmolean Museum, reg. no. 1928.409.

page 227 note 7 S. Hazzledine Warren Coll.; unpublished.

page 227 note 8 Curwen, , Suss. Arch. Coll., LXX (1929), figs. 31–2Google Scholar.

page 227 note 9 Williamson, Ross, Suss. Arch. Coll., LXXI (1930), pl. XI, 36Google Scholar; Curwen, , Ant. J., XIV (1934), fig. 8Google Scholar.

page 227 note 10 Burchell, and Piggott, , Ant. J., XIX (1939), figs. 6–8Google Scholar.

page 227 note 11 Musson, , S.A.C., LXXXIX (1950), fig. 3Google Scholar; all specimens are not illustrated here, but cf. Nos. 4 and 14 (the rim of the latter is not well depicted).

page 228 note 1 e.g., Whitehawk, , Suss. Arch. Coll., LXXVII (1936), fig. 4Google Scholar; Trundle, ibid., LXX (1939), pl. IX, 9, 10; Point, Lion, P.P.S., II (1936), fig. 2, 7Google Scholar. The Grovehurst pot (Piggott, , Arch. J., LXXXVIII (1931), fig. 21Google Scholar) must also be included here in spite of Piggott's revised views as to its affinities (Neo. Cult. Br. Is., 304).

page 228 note 2 Piggott, , Neo. Cult. Br. Is., 71Google Scholar.

page 228 note 3 e.g., one of the unpublished sherds from the Thames at Mortlake; London Museum, reg. no. A.13666.

page 228 note 4 Herring, , J.R.S.A.I., LXXI (1941), fig. 1Google Scholar.

page 228 note 5 Piggott, , Arch. J., LXXXVIII (1931), fig. 6Google Scholar.

page 228 note 6 A preliminary account of the first of a series of excavations has been published in The Bedfordshire Archaeologist, vol. I, no. 1 (March 1955)Google Scholar; Mr J. F. Dyer has very kindly allowed more specific reference to be made to the pottery here in advance of his definitive account.