considerably smaller and not so well baked as the other two, and had very much fallen to pieces from natural decay. This was placed eight inches lower than the central urn.
The northernmost was the same size as the central, though differing from it in the contraction of the rim, and when discovered was perfectly whole, but was unfortunately fractured by being separated from a large furze root, which had completely twined round the upper part. It, too, was placed on a lower level, by four inches, than the central urn. The two extreme urns were exactly five feet apart, and the interiors of them all were blackened by the carbon from the charcoal, burnt earth, and bones, which they contained.
Looking at their rude forms and large size, their straight sides, their wide mouths, the thickness, and the rough gritty texture of the paste,[1] the absence of nearly all ornamentation, and, with the exception, perhaps, of a slinging stone, of all weapons, we shall not be wrong in dating them as long anterior
- ↑ I certainly think that these urns were fired, though imperfectly. As Mr. Bateman remarks, sun-baked specimens soon return to their original clay. See Appendix to Ten Years' Diggings, p. 280.
These three urns, with all the other fragments of cinerary vessels found in the Forest, I have placed in the British Museum, where they have been restored. The artist has represented them exactly as they appeared on the second day of digging. The fractures in the central urn were caused by an unlucky blow from a pick-axe. The measurements are as follows:—
The north-eastern urn— Circumference at top 3 ft. „ „ bottom 1 „ 6 in. „ Total height 1 „ 4½ „ The central urn—The same. The south-western urn— Circumference at top 2 „ 9 „ „ „ bottom 1 „ 4½ „ „ Total height 1 „ 1¾ „
