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tiompan 5758 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 14:13
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Evergreen Dazed wrote: Another curious point, there is a small 'barrow' immediately outside the eastern entrance to the fort at ivinghoe, and it always surprised me when i visited that it was seemingly undamaged (apart from what looks like later interference at the top). Despite the respect afforded, you would think the general area of an entrance to a hilltop fort to be at times a very busy place and a place of considerable work. The barrow lies almost directly in front of the entrance. Ive read it may be a 'midden', maybe reinterpreted for that very reason, but does that seem likely? Are middens usually found in such locations, outside a fort entrance in particular? edit - poss cursus was from geophysical survey in 2000 rather than aerial photography Sometimes entrances were blocked , not in this case . Can't think of another example of a midden in a hill fort that looks like a barrow .
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Evergreen Dazed 1881 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 14:45
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tiompan wrote: Evergreen Dazed wrote: Another curious point, there is a small 'barrow' immediately outside the eastern entrance to the fort at ivinghoe, and it always surprised me when i visited that it was seemingly undamaged (apart from what looks like later interference at the top). Despite the respect afforded, you would think the general area of an entrance to a hilltop fort to be at times a very busy place and a place of considerable work. The barrow lies almost directly in front of the entrance. Ive read it may be a 'midden', maybe reinterpreted for that very reason, but does that seem likely? Are middens usually found in such locations, outside a fort entrance in particular? edit - poss cursus was from geophysical survey in 2000 rather than aerial photography Sometimes entrances were blocked , not in this case . Can't think of another example of a midden in a hill fort that looks like a barrow . I was getting confused. The report I read had the midden immed outside the entrance, but reading the HER says the midden is 60m from the entrance and the mound just outside the entrance is in fact a barrow.
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thesweetcheat 6218 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 14:55
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juamei wrote: I've always assumed its a case of barrows are built on a lot of hills, some of which were later use for hillforts. Builders of hillforts respected the burial mounds of their ancestors so built around them and left them in situ. Which is kinda boring, but seems the most likely to me. I'd be inclined to agree, from what I've seen. There are several forts that I've visited that have barrows inside the ramparts, eg Farmington in Glos (very reduced long barrow), Foel Fenlli and Penycloddiau (Clwydian Hills) and most recently Sully Island (near Cardiff). All of these are typical sites for IA defensive/status enclosures, I reckon they just respected the barrows and didn't want to damage them, but still wanted to use the site.
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Evergreen Dazed 1881 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 15:07
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thesweetcheat wrote: juamei wrote: I've always assumed its a case of barrows are built on a lot of hills, some of which were later use for hillforts. Builders of hillforts respected the burial mounds of their ancestors so built around them and left them in situ. Which is kinda boring, but seems the most likely to me. I'd be inclined to agree, from what I've seen. There are several forts that I've visited that have barrows inside the ramparts, eg Farmington in Glos (very reduced long barrow), Foel Fenlli and Penycloddiau (Clwydian Hills) and most recently Sully Island (near Cardiff). All of these are typical sites for IA defensive/status enclosures, I reckon they just respected the barrows and didn't want to damage them, but still wanted to use the site. Curious though, if you consider the esteem (fear?) with which they regarded them, if you accept they may have used them around a site as 'deterrent' to others. This is why I think Tiompans suggestion of refuge or storage would be more likely than them living 'full time' with such a 'powerful' monument in the same space.
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Sanctuary 4670 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 15:08
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thesweetcheat wrote: juamei wrote: I've always assumed its a case of barrows are built on a lot of hills, some of which were later use for hillforts. Builders of hillforts respected the burial mounds of their ancestors so built around them and left them in situ. Which is kinda boring, but seems the most likely to me. I'd be inclined to agree, from what I've seen. There are several forts that I've visited that have barrows inside the ramparts, eg Farmington in Glos (very reduced long barrow), Foel Fenlli and Penycloddiau (Clwydian Hills) and most recently Sully Island (near Cardiff). All of these are typical sites for IA defensive/status enclosures, I reckon they just respected the barrows and didn't want to damage them, but still wanted to use the site. I agree with you Alken regards the respect angle. The very site itself had 'meaning' to it other than the obvious defensive use.
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thesweetcheat 6218 posts |
Edited Sep 16, 2012, 15:27
Sep 16, 2012, 15:26
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Evergreen Dazed wrote: This is why I think Tiompans suggestion of refuge or storage would be more likely than them living 'full time' with such a 'powerful' monument in the same space. Yeah, I suspect a lot of what we call "forts" aren't so simple as the name implies, i.e. purely/primarily defensive structures. Some would probably have had a fairly permanent population (Croft Ambrey in Herefordshire appears to have had a series of residential phases, not to mention a possible/probably Celtic shrine), others may have been used for occasional purposes (again not necessary defensive, perhaps as a communal meeting place), and some were probably little more than stock enclosures/corrals.
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Resonox 604 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 15:27
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Just as an aside to the conversation...I was up Chanctonbury Ring today...there are several tumuli/barrow mounds around the outer limits of the "fort" boundary. ..All of an almost identical diameter...though they vary in height due to ploughing out etc. Considering how many people must have inhabited the fort during its life, why such a relatively few number of mounds....were only "important" people interred so close to the area...and if so, where did the others get buried (I am making a great assumption that these are actual graves I know). Strangely enough..just by the triangulation stone there is a cleared area...right sized for a tumulus.......it looks like some aftermath of excavation work....this would be the highest point on the hill too. I used to have a link which transferred present day maps into "ancient" maps...and showed intersting sites etc...but have since lost this.
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Sanctuary 4670 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 15:30
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Resonox wrote: Just as an aside to the conversation...I was up Chanctonbury Ring today...there are several tumuli/barrow mounds around the outer limits of the "fort" boundary. ..All of an almost identical diameter...though they vary in height due to ploughing out etc. Considering how many people must have inhabited the fort during its life, why such a relatively few number of mounds....were only "important" people interred so close to the area...and if so, where did the others get buried (I am making a great assumption that these are actual graves I know). Strangely enough..just by the triangulation stone there is a cleared area...right sized for a tumulus.......it looks like some aftermath of excavation work....this would be the highest point on the hill too. I used to have a link which transferred present day maps into "ancient" maps...and showed intersting sites etc...but have since lost this. It may be that the majority were cremated Resonox and scattered.
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Evergreen Dazed 1881 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 15:33
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Evergreen Dazed wrote: thesweetcheat wrote: juamei wrote: I've always assumed its a case of barrows are built on a lot of hills, some of which were later use for hillforts. Builders of hillforts respected the burial mounds of their ancestors so built around them and left them in situ. Which is kinda boring, but seems the most likely to me. I'd be inclined to agree, from what I've seen. There are several forts that I've visited that have barrows inside the ramparts, eg Farmington in Glos (very reduced long barrow), Foel Fenlli and Penycloddiau (Clwydian Hills) and most recently Sully Island (near Cardiff). All of these are typical sites for IA defensive/status enclosures, I reckon they just respected the barrows and didn't want to damage them, but still wanted to use the site. Curious though, if you consider the esteem (fear?) with which they regarded them, if you accept they may have used them around a site as 'deterrent' to others. This is why I think Tiompans suggestion of refuge or storage would be more likely than them living 'full time' with such a 'powerful' monument in the same space. Having said that.. (and isn't this just the marvellous thing about being immersed in this subject) it could be seen a different way. The hillfort was abandoned within a generation. What fits beautifully were if the people resting in the barrows thereabouts were known, or family, of the hillfort builders. In that scenario, a barrow within a 'full time' living defensive site may be understood, perhaps. And the site, an early one and abandoned after very little time, may have been, due to the proliferation of "non kin" barrows for want of a better expression, very unattractive to others wishing to reuse the site after its original inhabitants had gone. All just thoughts, and we could go on all day creating plausible scenarios, but I would certainly imagine the ancestors in those mounds had a strong influence upon whoever built or used that site.
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Evergreen Dazed 1881 posts |
Sep 16, 2012, 15:46
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Resonox wrote: Just as an aside to the conversation...I was up Chanctonbury Ring today...there are several tumuli/barrow mounds around the outer limits of the "fort" boundary. ..All of an almost identical diameter...though they vary in height due to ploughing out etc. Considering how many people must have inhabited the fort during its life, why such a relatively few number of mounds....were only "important" people interred so close to the area...and if so, where did the others get buried (I am making a great assumption that these are actual graves I know). Strangely enough..just by the triangulation stone there is a cleared area...right sized for a tumulus.......it looks like some aftermath of excavation work....this would be the highest point on the hill too. I used to have a link which transferred present day maps into "ancient" maps...and showed intersting sites etc...but have since lost this. Moving into the IA, there were generally no burials, or very few. Bones are found, suggesting bodies were left to rot. Postholes at ivinghoe found during the geophysical survey which revealed the poss cursus, we're interpreted as a poss excarnation platform.
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