Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 42

Iron remained a curiosity and a subject for experiment for many centuries after 1200 BC, and only gained impetus when bronze supplies became more precarious. Ironworking reached Calabria in 9th century but spread very slowly through N Italy. In Temperate Europe small iron objects appeared occasionally from Late Urnfield on (10th century), then more often in Ha B2-3/Mont IV-V as iron blades began to appear, reaching a peak with the great Ha C swords. An extensive survey of horsegear and other orientalizing bronzes illustrates formative influences of the Hallstatt Culture.

Following an outline of some aspects of Continental Early Celtic art in which the importance of Mediterranean plant-derived motifs and compass construction work is emphasized, the authors consider some significant aspects of the development of the various sword sub-styles. An analysis of selected insular pieces points out the differences from, rather than the seeming similarities to, Continental Celtic art. It is argued that the earliest of such pieces cannot antedate the developed 3rd-century sword style(s) though absolute chronology is impossible to achieve as yet. The later insular styles see a unique re-emergence of the reliance on compass-based designs. Au

TA 056673. After a Mesolithic occupation with pits and hearths the site had been successively cleared, cultivated and abandoned before the digging of a pair of parallel ditches c 40m long. After a period of silting a 58m structure enclosed by a timber wall set in a bedding trench had a banked burial chamber with a forecourt at its E end. The construction of the long barrow took place in two phases separated by burning of lengths of the timber enclosure. A ring ditch dug across the line of the avenue E of the long barrow belongs to an EBA use of the locality. Any covering round barrow mound had been completely removed by cultivation over the last 100 years. Reports on the pre-barrow enviromnent, human and animal bones are appended. Au(adp)

Describes analyses performed in an attempt to provide objective comparison between sites known only from aerial photographs and excavated enclosures ('causewayed camps') to which they are thought to relate. The results of a series of attribute analyses (43 sites) appear to justify the unity of the class, even though some enclosures are low-lying and some on high ground. A division into four geographical groups -South-West, Sussex, Thames and Midlands - is suggested. The study also justified the use of aerial photography as a means of comparative analysis.

[TF 096086]. Two barrows formed part of a cemetery in use towards the middle of the 2nd millennium BC. The smaller barrow contained a large pit-grave with successive inhumation burials associated with a long-necked Beaker, bronze earrings and a flint knife. The larger barrow began as a small mound covering an inhumation burial with a Food Vessel. Four stake circles were added following a second inhumation burial and the mound was twice enlarged. Links with Yorkshire are evident. Au(adp)

TL 794685. Construction and use of the bowl barrow ran from about 2000 to 1675 BC; it covered, successively, a contracted burial of a child in a pit grave with hybrid Beaker; a contracted burial of an adult with a late Beaker; an unaccompanied burial in a tree-trunk coffin; a burial with jet beads and spacer plate; and a cremation cemetery. Soil samples, human and animal bones are described; four of the individuals buried could be of the same family.

SK 1653. The dagger acquired in 1873 and rediscovered after wartime storage is published for the first time. The blade is of unique shape, has three rivet holes and a rivet notch and is of arsenical copper with a rivet of different alloy. Its whale ivory pommel (?earliest in Britain) has a tenon fixing. With the dagger was a battle-axe, Roe's Calais Wold, Stage 2; both items would fit a Migdale-Marnoch or developed Beaker context, just pre-Wessex Culture.