A HISTORY OF DERBYSHIRE 29 drinking cups, all associated with unburnt interments ; 65 food vessels, of which 48 were associated with unburnt, and 17 with burnt inter- ments ; 1 1 incense cups, all associated with burnt interments. These numbers must be taken as approximate only ; and it is a question whether some of the smaller food vases associated with the burnt interments should not be regarded as incense cups, but the numbers are sufficiently trustworthy for the present purpose. The association of certain types of vessels with certain modes of burial is not confined to Derbyshire, but appears to be general throughout the country ; it suggests therefore a progress in time rather than local or tribal peculiarities. Far back in the Bronze age, inhumation, it would seem, was the sole mode of sepulture, and that during the earlier part of that stage the drinking cup was first used and was afterwards supplanted by the food vase. Then during the reign of the latter, cremation, which had hitherto been confined to certain subsidiary interments referred to above, passed into a general fashion. But it must not be inferred from this that cremation supplanted inhumation. For anything we know to the contrary, the two modes may have continued side by side until the Roman occupation. At first, it would seem, the cremated remains were deposited in cists or were otherwise disposed of after the manner of inhumated bodies ; but soon they were placed in or under the familiar cinerary urns and were sometimes accompanied by the little incense cups. That the table represents a sequence, has much of a confirmatory nature from other sources. In no ' multiple ' barrow in our area has a drinking cup interment been found under conditions which can be said to prove that it was of later introduction than a neighbouring food vase or urned interment, if present ; nor is there an example of a food vase inhumated interment succeeding an urned cremated one ; whereas the converse has been frequently noted. If we apply the tests of vertical and horizontal positions, we get similar results. The usual position of a primary interment is on or below the old natural surface ; of a secondary, on or above that level. The following table gives the percentages of these positions, when ascertain- able. 1 Interments Drinking cups Food vases Cinerary urns Below 83 43 36-5 On '7 3i 36-5 Above natural level . . O . . 26 . . 27 It will be observed that in passing from the drinking cup to the urned interments, the proportion of those below the old natural level 1 Tabulated in the same manner, Messrs. Bateman and Carrington's Staffordshire excavations give the following results : On Above natural level '5 o 13 37 33 60 I 7 8 Interments with Below Drinking cups . . . . 85 Food vases 5 Cinerary urns .... 7
